The tournament, which continues at the Pierre de Courbertin Stadium until Sunday (January 25), opens the new Premier League season and will see a record 912 athletes from 68 countries competing.

As well as Lofty, Erkan and Agier, Italy's Luigi Busà and Sara Cardin, Turkey's Serap Özçelik, Georgian Gogita Arkania and Kayo Someya of Japan - all of them World Championships medallists - will be among the field, as well as Azerbaijan's four-time world champion Rafael Aghayev.

The most contested categories will be the kata individual male with 123 athletes from 38 nations and the kumite male under 67kg with 115 fighters from 40 nations.

Four-time world champion Rafael Aghayev will compete in Paris this weekend ©Getty Images


The action begins tomorrow with the male and female individual kata and team kata elimination and repechages.

The finals will be broadcast live on French sports television channel L'Equipe 21 on Sunday (January 25).

Real time results can be found here. 

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