Yanet Bermoy Acosta

Outstanding Cuban judoka. World champion in Cairo 2005 and Olympic runner-up in Beijing 2008, in the 48 kilograms division.

She was born in the San Lázaro neighborhood, in the city of Cienfuegos. Her first sporting inclination was toward athletics, although shortly after, when she turned 9 years old, she switched to judo. The discovery of this budding star was made by Julio Brito, a coach of this martial art in the youth categories, during a search for talent to form a women's team.

Her passage through the school category was dizzying. In 1998 she finished with a silver medal in the provincial championship, 11-12 years category. She was selected to participate in a pioneer tournament in the Dominican Republic, where she finished second in the 32 kilograms division. The following year, she repeated her participation in the competition and this time she won the gold medal, as well as in the Central American championships of that category, also in Dominican soil.

Her fighting style and the way she acted on the tatami opened doors for her in 1999 to enter the Provincial School of Sports Initiation (EIDE), under the guidance of Raidel Alonso in the 44 kilograms division. During the following years she obtained countless victories in the National School Games and in Cuban championships.

In September 2003, now competing in the 48 kilograms division and as part of the national pre-selection under the tutelage of her coach Santiago Chinea, Bermoy won the national championship among seniors and in the following season achieved the silver medal at the II Cuban Sports Olympiad, losing only to her compatriot, the outstanding Amarilis Savón. She ended the year with silver medals in an International Judo Cup in Margarita Islands, Venezuela, and in the First National Youth Olympiad, held in Ciego de Ávila.

Her first tour of Europe took place starting in February 2005, where she obtained bronze in the Super Cup of the World Villa de París and in the International Class A Tournament Leonding of Austria, as well as a seventh place in World Master, in Germany. Subsequently, she achieved gold medals in the XI Central American Championship in Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic; in the Iberoamerican Championship and in the Simón Bolívar Cup, both held in Venezuela, and in the I Games of the Bolivarian Alternative for the Americas (ALBA), in Havana.

The coaching staff directed by and still led by professor Ronaldo Veitía decided to include her in the team for the World Championship in Cairo 2005. And the young woman, making her debut in top-level events, did not disappoint them. For the coveted gold medal she had to face French Jossinet Frederique, Olympic silver medalist from Athens 2004 and world champion from Osaka 2003. The fight was close, but the Cuban girl followed to the letter the tactical plan of her coaches: always work with a single hand in the European style and avoid the grappling combat preferred by her opponent. In the end, she won by wazzari (three-quarters of a point) and, against all predictions, she secured first place. She had the honor of becoming the first Cuban and Latin American woman to win the judo title in her division at World Championships. This victory by Bermoy in the 48 kilograms division gave Cuba first place by country in the women's category, ahead of Japan, the traditional dominator of these championships.

At the end of the year she was invited to the Champions Gala in Fukuoka, Japan, where she achieved a bronze medal. She was rightfully chosen as the best rookie of the year in her country and one of the most well-rounded athletes in high-performance sport in Cuba.

In 2006 she elevated her athletic mastery, despite her young age and few years on the tatamis. The most relevant achievement was her victory in the Junior World Championship held in Santo Domingo, the capital of the Dominican Republic. With the senior world title, the judoka from Cienfuegos went in as the favorite and dominated all the matches she competed in. She displayed an example of technique against her five rivals, culminating in her victory by wazzari against Shugen Wu, of China.

No less important in that year were her successes at the Central American and Caribbean Games in Cartagena de Indias, Colombia, where she was part of the All-Stars; in the Pan-American Championship of the discipline in Buenos Aires, in the International Golden Judoka tournament and the III Cuban Sports Olympiad, both in the largest of the Antilles. She obtained silver in the team world championship in Paris and in the Super Cup of the World in Germany. She was selected as one of the 10 best athletes in Cuba and the Pan-American Judo Union chose her as the best judoka of the Americas in 2006.

Among her main achievements in 2007, the first places at the Pan-American Sports Games in the carioca city of Rio de Janeiro stood out, where she was awarded the ippón Trophy; the continental championship in Canada; the II Games of ALBA and the Margarita Islands Cup, in Venezuela, and the Golden Judoka tournament, in Cuba, among other very strong events in the Old Continent. However, at the World Championship in Rio de Janeiro, she was unable to defend her world title, so she had to settle for the never despicable silver medal.

In 2008 she participated in several events in which she reaffirmed her status as a relevant athlete. She triumphed in the World Cup held in Warsaw, Poland, where she was one of the main attractions of the qualifying event. She was a bronze medalist at the Super Cup of the World in Villa de París, seventh in the International Tournament in Belgium, fifth in a similar event in Hungary and first in Belgium, all Class A, where the best in the world participate in each division.

In 2008 Beijing, the Chinese capital, organized the event under the five rings and Janet Bermoy went in search of the greatest honor. But Romanian Alina Alexandra Dumitru won by ippón and cut short the Cuban's aspirations, who took home the silver medal.

In 2009 she participated in her third senior world championship. The event was held in the Dutch city of Rotterdam, and Bermoy finished second again. At just 22 years old, she obtained a gold medal at the London 2012 Olympic Games.

In 2013, she wins a gold medal at the Grand Prix in Miami in the 52 kg category.