MBALLA ATANGANA Hortence Vanessa

General
RIO EXPERIENCE AND WEIGHT CHANGE
She was the only Cameroonian judoka competing at the 2016 Olympic Games in Rio de Janeiro, where she was eliminated in the first round. "Unfortunately it didn't go well. At the time, I was only 24 years old." In 2017 she moved up from the -78kg category to the +78kg category. She said she found the change tough at first, but that winning bronze in the +78kg category at the 2020 Grand Slam event in Dusseldorf, Germany, helped her confidence in her new category. "I was in the -78kg category until 2017, and then my trainer and I decided to move up and it was difficult. This is without a doubt my best medal and it gives me even more confidence in my coach and my training." (olympics.com, 05 Feb 2021; actu.fr, 02 Mar 2020; actucameroun.com, 28 Feb 2020; laval.maville.com, 25 Sep 2018)

FROM CAMEROON TO FRANCE
She moved from Cameroon to France in 2010, joining the Regional Youth and Sports Centre in Rouen with the help of an International Olympic Committee [IOC] scholarship. She left Rouen the following year to join coach Rodrigue Chenet of Judo Club Chateau-Gontier, whom she had met at a training camp. (ouest-france.fr, 03 Mar 2021, 11 Jul 2013; olympics.com, 05 Feb 2021; lamayenneonadore.fr, 14 Apr 2016)

OTHER ACTIVITIES
In 2019 she established Association Rayon d'Afrique, which aims to help the development of judo in Cameroon. (Rayon d'Afrique Facebook page, 11 Apr 2021; actu.fr, 24 Jun 2019)