Tokyo (AFP) – A young sumo wrestler made history this Sunday March 24 by winning a major tournament just a year and a half after his debut in this Japanese discipline, the fastest rise ever observed, and also breaking another record 110 years old.
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Takerufuji, 24, brandished the Emperor’s Cup at the end of the spring tournament in Osaka (west) after defeating his rival Gonoyama, another rising sumo star.
The victory of the 1.84m and 143kg colossus was anything but certain, after an ankle injury during his fight the day before, which forced him to return to the locker room in a wheelchair before being transported to the hospital to undergo examinations.
“ At that point I had given up all hope » to win the tournament, explained Monday during a press conference Takerufuji, who trains in the same heya or “stable” as the great champion (“yokozuna”) Terunofuji, who himself was withdrawn due to injury.
But ” the yokozuna came to see me and said: “you are capable of doing it. It’s not the record that counts, but the memory. It doesn’t matter if you lose, this opportunity won’t come again ” “, recalled Takerufuji.
Hair not yet long enough…
Since his first steps in September 2022 on the dohyo, the clay ring where the fights take place, Takerufuji, or Mikiya Ishioka of his real name, has crossed the five lower divisions at a staggering speed, suffering only 10 defeats in 79 fights.
His victory after just 10 tournaments made him the fastest man in sumo history to lift the cup. He is also the first newcomer to the top division to win a tournament there since 1914.
The triumph of the young man from Aomori, in the north of Japan, is so early that according to the Japanese press he is also the first to win a tournament when his hair is not yet long enough to form the ceremonial bun “oicho” (“ginkgo”), so called because it resembles a leaf of this tree.
This positive news is welcome for the world of sumo, regularly shaken by scandals. Former yokozuna Hakuho was sanctioned last month for acts of violence committed by one of his disciples, who was himself excluded from the sport.
Last July, another former sumotori denounced mistreatment suffered for nearly eight years, with physical violence and regular bullying.