THORNBURY'S Olympic medal winning judoka Sally Conway has begun her return to competition in fine form after taking a silver medal in the Cancun Grand Prix.

One of four medals claimed by GB Judo on the second day of the competition in Mexico, Conway’s silver is her second in a row from her only two competitions since the Rio games last year, having come second in Bucharest two weeks ago.

The win pushed her further up the world rankings to 14, having dropped outside the top 10 after time away from competition.

The -70kg judoka made short work of Dunia Santo from Honduras in her first round contest showing her experience to eventually apply an Ude-Gatame arm lock and forced Santo to tap.

Conway’s trademark newaza skills were to the fore in her quarter-final against Spain’s Sara Rodriguez.

The Spanish judoka is a former Junior European championship medallist but she had no answer to Conway’s judo as she was held down for ippon. 

The British judoka followed this up with arguably her best performance of the day against the world number one Elvismar Rodriguez from Venezuela.

Rodriguez struggled to match Conway’s all-round judo but did well to take things into the deciding stage of golden score.

However, once the instant knock-out phase began, Conway took less than a minute to finally get the decisive waza-ari score, seeing off the top seed to book her spot in the final, facing another Spaniard, long-time rival Maria Bernabeu.

Leading their head to head four-to-two, Conway looked the favourite on paper, but the Spanish judoka, who had looked strong throughout the day proved to be the same in the final.

Conway had an early chance stopped and after that Bernabeu took control, getting herself out in front on the scoreboard and forced Conway on the defensive with her strength and gripping.

In her attempts to hold her opponent at bay, Conway was forced to pick up three shido penalties, ending her run in the tournament and resulting in her missing out on her first Grand Prix gold since Jeju in 2015.

Conway said however she was pleased with how the competition went, saying how great it felt to be back competing at the top level.

She told the Gazette: "It feels great to be back competing again after 10 months off competition judo. 

"I'm really enjoying being back on the world circuit and am really looking forward to the World Championships in September. 

"Being able to face up to the top girls in my weight category is a great feeling. I still have work to do to get back up to competition speed and sharpness but I feel I'm on the right track."