Bianca Walkden


Bianca Walkden is a United Kingdom British Taekwondo competitor and a member of the GB Taekwondo Academy. She represented Great Britain at 2016 Olympic Games winning a bronze medal. Walkden is a triple World champion, twice European champion, and twice World Grand Prix Final champion in her division. In 2017 she became the first practitioner ever to win all 4 Grand Prix events in her division in a single season
In May 2015 she won the gold medal in the +73kg category at the 2015 World Taekwondo Championships in Russia beating Gwladys Epangue in the final. She became only the second Briton to win a world title after Sarah Stevenson in 2001 and 2011, and the third to win a global title after Stevenson and Jade Jones' Olympic success in 2012.
In June 2017, Walkden successfully defended her world title in Muju, South Korea during the 2017 Muju WTF World Taekwondo Championship. She beat American Jackie Galloway 14-4 in the heavyweight division. She joins Jade Jones as the only British practitioners to defend a global title, and becoming the only Briton to successfully defend a World title in taekwondo.
In May 2019 at the 2019 World Taekwondo Championships, Walkden won the women's heavyweight title after her opponent Zheng Shuyin was disqualified despite holding a 20-10 lead over Walkden. The disqualification occurred because Walkden, in the face of Zheng's inactivity following her attainment of a ten-point lead, but having also accrued seven penalty points, repeatedly pushed Zheng out of the ring to raise Zheng's penalty points to ten. This resulted in boos during the result announcement and medal presentation, when Zheng was criticised for falling to her knees on receiving her medal, Great Britain performance director Gary Hall taking issue with her "disrespectful manner". Walkden defended her tactics, saying: "I went out there needing to find a different way to win and a win is a win if you disqualify someone - it's not my fault."