Carolina Costa doesn’t stop winning. The judoka from Messina of the Fiamme Azzurre of the Penitentiary Police won the fourth consecutive European title in the +70 kg J2 category in Heidelberg, Germany.
Carolina Costa dominated. The Italian’s journey began with a clear victory over the Spanish Maria Campos Fernandez, overcome by ippon. Same script in the second match, against the Azerbaijani Dursadaf Karimova, beaten before the limit at the end of a test conducted with great technical authority. In the final, Costa completed his triumphant ride by winning again by ippon over the English Kirsten Taylor and thus getting his hands on yet another gold of his extraordinary career.
A success of particular value, because it came from an athlete who started as the favourite: «I arrived at this European Championship as the favourite, aware of being the athlete to beat – says Carolina Costa – and for the fourth consecutive year I managed to reconfirm myself on the top step of the podium. It is a result that encompasses years of sacrifices, training, work and many difficulties overcome.”
The new triumph in Heidelberg is part of a list of achievements that now has few equals. Costa, among the various medals, won bronze at the Tokyo 2020 Games, before becoming world champion in Baku in 2022 and in Birmingham in 2023. In 2025, in Tbilisi, she achieved her third consecutive European title, while in Paris 2024 she finished the Paralympic tournament in fifth place. A placing that had not affected his desire to return to the top and which today finds an answer on the German tatami.
«Representing Italy and bringing it back to the highest step in Europe once again is an indescribable emotion», underlines the Italian, who shares this result with the people around her: «I thank my family, my coach Vittorio Scimone, my Judo Franco Costa gym and my sports group Fiamme Azzurre of the Penitentiary Police».
A sporting history that has its roots in the family. Next to Carolina there is always her mother-coach Katarzyna Juszczak, protagonist at the Barcelona 1992 and Athens 2004 Games. Carolina is the daughter of the late maestro Franco Costa, after whom the gym in which the European champion built her triumphs is named.
