2010 January Sumo Tournament

bakahage

Some shots from the final day of the January sumo tournament in Tokyo that I took on Sunday.

Qarik

awesome shots..great processing as well!

OldGuy

Great shots. I lived in Tokyo back in the late '60s, and Sumo was my favorite spectator sport.

BTW, the wrestler on the sideline next to the dude with the camera in #5 looks Gaijin. Yes?

bakahage

OldGuy wrote:

BTW, the wrestler on the sideline next to the dude with the camera in #5 looks Gaijin. Yes?

That is Kotoōshū Katsunori (Kaloyan Stefanov Mahlyanov is his pre-sumo name) and he is Bulgarian. In 2005 he reached the rank of ozeki, which is the second-highest level in the sumo ranking system behind only yokozuna. In May of 2008, Kotoōshū made history by becoming the first European sumo wrestler to win an Emperor's Cup.

Cayuse

Nice photos.

Has a gaijin made it to Yokozuna yet? When I lived in Japan in the late 80's Konishiki rode to the rank of Ozeki but I think that was as far as he advanced.

bakahage

Cayuse wrote:

Nice photos.

Has a gaijin made it to Yokozuna yet? When I lived in Japan in the late 80's Konishiki rode to the rank of Ozeki but I think that was as far as he advanced.

Yes there have been several.
As you know, Konishiki should have been made Yokozuna on his record, but was denied due to being foreign born.

Akebono (American from Hawaii) was the first foreign-born yokozuna (1993) and in the late 90s Musashimaru (Samoan born, but American from Hawaii) became the second. The two current Yokozuna, Asashoryu (won this last tournament) and Hakuho are both Mongolian.