AGBEGNENOU Clarisse

General
RIO REDEMPTION
She says she was disappointed to leave the 2016 Olympic Games in Rio de Janeiro with the silver medal, and is using her disappointment to focus her attention on going one step further and winning gold at the 2020 Games in Tokyo. "I was so much expecting the gold medal that I have never accepted this one [silver]. It is hidden somewhere in my house. I never see it. It's like if I had lost it. I rather say that I am a multiple world champion than I am an Olympic silver medallist. It's a shame, isn't it? To forget Rio, I will have inevitably to win [at the 2020 Olympic Games] in Tokyo. I do not do all of this, all this work not to be an Olympic champion one day." (leparisien.fr, 03 Jan 2019)

OCCUPATION
She is a member of the National Gendarmerie, a national police force in France which also serves as a branch of the French Armed Forces. (sports.defense.gouv.fr, 31 Oct 2019; Twitter profile, 28 Jun 2020)

HERITAGE
Her parents are from the West African country Togo, and she holds dual French and Togolese citizenship. She maintains strong ties to the country, and Togo's President Faure Gnassingbe personally congratulated her after she won the world title in 2014. (clarissesport.com, 29 May 2015)

EARLY LIFE
She was born two months premature alongside twin brother Aurelien. "I was born 'dead'. When I was taken out from my mother I did not breathe, I had to be reanimated because I was dead." After her birth she had kidney surgery and was in a coma for seven days. She has since become an ambassador for a French organisation that helps premature babies and their parents. (TF1 Le JT Facebook page, 09 Mar 2019)

In 2019 she became the first French female judoka to be crowned individual world champion for the fourth time when she claimed gold in the -63kg at the 2019 World Championships in Tokyo, Japan. (huffingtonpost.fr, 28 Aug 2019; SportsDeskOnline, 13 Mar 2020)