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Grand
Sumo Update
A resurgent
Asashoryu took the Aki basho with a 14-1 mark, for his twentyfourth yusho.
He was zensho until senshuraku, when Hakuho, who came in 13-1. Beat him to
force a playoff. Asashoryu won the playoff by sukuinage. Hakuho
would have been zensho coming into senshuraku himself, if he hadn’t
given up a kinboshi to maekashira two East Shotenryu on day six.
Ozekis Kotooshu
and Kotomitsuki kept pace with the yokozunas for the first five days.
Kotooshu suffering his first loss on day six, and Kotomitsuki on day
seven. They both finished the basho with 9-6 marks; as did ozeki
Haramafuji. Ozeki Kaio, finished with an 8-7 mark; moving into second
place on the all time wins list. Ozeki Chiyotakai withdrew on day
eleven after only two wins.
Topping all the
ozeki was komosubi East Baruto (Estonia) with a 12-3 mark. With
loses only to the two yokozuna and maegashira three west Kakuryu. He
beat all five ozeki. Also topping all the ozeki with 11-4 marks were
maegashira twelve East Tochiozan, and maegashira fourteen West Hokotoriki.
Followed by maegashira five East Goeido, and maegashira thirteen West
Wakanosato, both at 10-5.
In the lower
divisions, Juryo one East Tamawashi (Mongolia) took that division with a
11-4 mark. Makushita East ten Gagamaru (Georgia) 7-0, Sandanme East
twenty nine Aoki 7-0, Jonidan West fifty nine 7-0, and Jonokuchi West
thirty Aoiyama (Bulgaria) 7-0, won their respective divisions.
In the sansho
(special prizes), there was no shukun-sho (outstanding award) this basho.
That’s because the shukun-sho goes to a maegashira who earns a kinboshi
(gold star), by beating a yokozuna, and finishes the basho with a winning
record. The only kinboshi given up in Aki basho was the one Hakuho
surrendered to Shotenryu, who only won one more match. The kanto-sho
(fighting spirit) award (his fourth) went to Baruto 12-3. Maegashira
three West Kakuryu, 11-4, won the gino-sho (technigue prize), also his
fourth.
In the banzuke for Kyushu Basho, ozeki Kaio will
be making his ninty-eighth start in the top division, breaking a tie with
Takamiyama. Ozeki Chiyotakai will be kadoban for the fourteenth time
in his career, setting a new record for that dubious distingshun.
Gagumaru (Georgia) moves up to juryo, to become the third sekitori from
that small country.
Tonkatsu
Rides Again
By “Tonkatsu”
note: In this
article, Tonkatsu once again borrows a page from Caesar and refers to
himself in the third person.
Long before
Tonkatsu ever put on a judo gi, or strapped on a mawashi, even before he
played Rugby, Gaelic football and Hurling, a much younger and thinner
Tonkatsu was a bicycle racer. He competed in road races and track
races, both here in California and in Maryland and Virginia.
When Tonkatsu
first started racing, he didn’t have a car yet. If his coach
couldn’t give him a ride, he would try and ride to the track or road
race venue. On one occasion, he left his apartment in West Hollywood
on Saturday evening, rode all knight to Norton Air Force base in San
Bernardino, took sixth place in the twenty mile novice race, collected his
prize of a T-shirt, and rode home; a total of one hundred fifty six miles.
Before he left
for Virginia in December of 1963 Tonkatsu was riding three hundred fifty
miles a week and weighed just one hundred fifty seven pounds. He
raced in Maryland and Virginia in 1964, winning one small race. He
returned to California in 1965.
Tonkatsu’s
best ever finish in a California road race was in the B division in
Lindsay California in1966, where he came a close third in a sprint won by
future Olympian Chuck Pranke. He stopped racing after the 1967
season.
Tonkatsu’s
road bike was stolen in 1973. For the next thirty five years he rode
his one speed track bike on the street with a single hand brake. The
last time he rode a bike in any kind of race was during his short
triathalon phase in 1984. The longest race he did was the Seal Beach
triathlon, which consisted of a 1K swim, a 20K bike ride and a 10K run.
In 1998 and
1999, Tonkatsu competed in the shot put in the senior Olympics, taking a
fourth place, and a fifth placer. Since then, he has frequently
received entry forms for senior Olympics with bicycle racing. This
has often been tempting to Tonkatsu. The catch was that senior
Olympics only allow multi gear bicycles with two hand brakes. Fixed
gear bikes like Tonkatsu’s old track bike aren’t allowed, and new road
bikes can cost thousands of dollars.
In the spring
of 2008, Tonkatsu received such an entry form from the Pasadena Senior
Olympics. The bicycle races were going to be at El Dorado park in
Long Beach. Tonkatsu approached his friends at the Future
Generations Youth Center at Houghton Park in Long Beach. They run a
program for kids, who can earn bicycles or repairs by doing community
service. They get lots of donations, and they were able to fix
Tonkatsu up with a Nishiki twelve speed from the early eighties.
With a steel frame, it was only slightly different from Tonkatsu’s old
ten speed.
The Pasadena
Senior Olympics offered two days of racing. There was a 5K time
trial and a 40K road race on a Tuesday, and a 10K time trial and 20K road
race on the following day. Tonkatsu decided to only enter the 5K
time trial. He only had about six weeks to prepare. When he arrived
at the venue with his borrowed twenty plus year old bike, Tonkatsu got
some idea of how Rip Van Winkle must have felt. Virtually everyone
there had a newer, more sophisticated, much more expensive bike.
Tonkatsu spent
a fair amount of time talking to people he knew from forty years ago, when
he should have been warming up. The race started on a slight down
grade, and Tonkasu got off to a good start. Unfortunately, about a
half mile into the race, the saddle slipped forward. Tonkatsu spent
the rest of the race slowing down to bounce up and down on the seat to try
and get it back in place. He ended up with the slowest time of
anyone of any age or gender in the race. 13 :52 . World class
distance runners can run 5 K faster than that!
The nice thing
about time trialing is that you can always try to beat your own best time.
The nice thing about the five year age groups of the senior Olympics is
that there were more riders in their seventies than there were in the
sixties. There were even five riders in their eighties! So
Tonkatsu can compete as long as he is able. Since then, he has
bought a new rode bike on ebay In this years Senior Olympics,
he cut his time for the 5K down to 10:51 and set up a time of 25:11 for
the 10K.
Tonkatsu on his way to
winning the single speed open in the 20Km time trial at Lake Piru in
September.
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Japanese
American Twins Enter Sumo
Information
from “Honetakawa”.
Japanese
American twin brothers Jun Saito and Rei Saito entered the Maezumo
division as members of Dewanoumi Beya for Aki basho.
Born on Dec.19, 1986 in Kakuda City, Miyagi
Prefecture of a Japanese mother and an American father. The Saito brothers
Attended Cutbank High School and Browning College (2years) in Montana.
They wrestled and played American football.
Elder brother Jun Saito Shikona Fujinoumi 190cm. 123kg, took six matches
to get the three wins need to enter jonakuchi. Younger brother Rei Saito
Shikona Fujinohana 189cm. 139kg, did it in three matches. Note:
Matsuzaki-san tells us that in actual practice, wrestlers move up even if
they have no wins.
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Georgia
Sumo Open
By Packy Bannevans
Rain, rain go away! The 5th Annual Georgia Sumo Open was held during
the midst of record setting rainfall and flooding. Thank goodness
the organizers of JapanFest had the foresight 3 years ago to bring our
event indoors to the Gwinnett Convention Center.
In spite of the
inclement weather, we had a record turnout of wrestlers for Georgia Sumo
Open V. There was also a good balance among the weight classes as we
had 3 heavies, 4 middles, and 4 lighties (including 2 women). Two of
these 11 rikishi were new recruits who signed up out of the audience –
Dee Dee Whitmire and Eric Lamb.
We were the
first martial arts group to take the stage at JapanFest 2009 and the crowd
grew rapidly in size. We began with a general talk about sumo and a
brief demonstration as usual. We also brought the children from the
audience on stage to spar with us. After the crowd was sufficiently
pumped up, we began the actual tournament.
The first of
the lightweight competitors was Steve Bird from the Illinois Sumo
Association who finished 3rd at this year’s Nationals. Next up was
Stiliyan Georgeiv who finished 2nd at the 2008 World Championships and was
2nd in the European Championships earlier this year. Finally,
Catherine Watkins of the Georgia Sumo Association agreed to fight these
two men as there were no other women to be found. Catherine fought
bravely, but in the end the two men fought for 1st and 2nd place with
Stiliyan emerging victorious.
During the
lightweight competition, Dee Dee Whitmire was registering as the latest
member of the USSF. We therefore held a best 2 out of 3 competition
with our two female rikishi. Catherine dominated her opponent to
garner two quick wins and a gold medal.
Next up were
the middleweights with yours truly versus Ryan Church of Oceanside and
Robert Daniel of Memphis. Ryan and Robert started things off with
Robert pulling out a victory. A newcomer to the sumo world, Robert
was competing in only his 3rd tournament, but he has already made a name
for himself by placing 3rd at this year’s Nationals.
After turning
40 the weekend before, I was determined to show that a Masters level
wrestler could still hold his own. With a bit of luck, I was able to
fend off both of my opponents to take 1st place for the first time ever in
my own tournament. Robert earned a silver and Ryan a bronze medal as
well. Eric could have also fought with us, but his late entry put
him into the Open tournament instead.
It was no
surprise that the heavyweight matches were dominated by current
heavyweight and open weight national champion Dan Kalbfleisch. Dan
took care of his first foe – Tom Zabel of the Lone Star Sumo Association
– in his first big boy bout. Tom was again outside the tawara in
his next match with Joe Isamau of San Francisco, setting up the final to
be between Joe and Dan. Dan again proved his mettle and captured top
honors.
The open
tournament was a thriller in large part because of Dan’s suggestion of
using a seeded, double-elimination bracket based on the results of the
day’s earlier matches. All in all there were 19 fights before two
heavyweights and one lightweight emerged on top. The crowd was
thrilled as Stiliyan worked his way through the winner’s bracket before
finally losing to Dan. After dropping to the loser’s side,
Stiliyan faced Joe and threw him to the mats for a 2nd time, setting up a
rematch with Dan. In what proved to be the penultimate bout,
Stiliyan edged out a victory against Dan to force a tiebreaker. In
the end, Dan proved to be too much to handle as Stiliyan was forced to the
ground after attempting to execute an ashi-tori.
Special thanks
are due to the following people for their help in making this year’s
Georgia Sumo Open the biggest and best ever. Dan – for bringing the
dohyo and blank brackets, as well as for serving as referee. Catherine –
for her photographs which captured the fighting spirit of the competitors
Lisa Hannabach – for signing up new members and keeping track of the
wins and losses Kelly Bannevans – for preparing the medals
All the competitors (especially our 2 new recruits) – for helping to set
up and take down
We did charge a $10 entry fee this year for the first time, but each
participant received a T-shirt in return. There are extras if anyone
is interested! We hope to see you at next year’s event!!
Note: The T-shirts are $10. Check with Packy at packy@mindspring.com
Middle weight Robert Daniel
right. vs. Heavyweight Joe Isamau Left in an open division match at the
Georgia Sumo Open. Joe won this one.
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