Sumo Wrestling

Outside Ryogoku Kokugikan sumo stadium

We're lucky to get tickets for one of the three honbosho sumo wrestling tournaments in Tokyo (the official, professional tournaments).  The tournament lasts 15 days and each wrestler competes once a day, with his wins/losses tallied in order to determine who is the winner.  There are several different divisions, with the less skilled wrestlers starting in the morning to the champions competing at the end of the day.  It's a full schedule - the bouts start at 9:00am and go almost non-stop until after 6:00pm.  Each wrestler only competes once, so after about 30 seconds they're done for the day!

The sumo dohyo (ring).  The stands fill up more later in the day as the better wrestlers compete.

Take that!

We arrive early because we have other plans for the evening, so we can't stay for the entire time.  But we stay much longer than I thought we would!  It's surprisingly interesting - and much more entertaining than the geisha performance we saw (sorry, geishas!).  

We don't really know anything about the sumo wrestlers, but they are divided into "east" and "west," and we're sitting on the west side of the stadium, so we have someone to cheer for - that helps to make it fun. 

My favorite part of the pre-match activities!

Wrestler landing on the judge - it might hurt a little!

We're aware the wrestlers are ranked, but I didn't know the judges (gyoji) are, too.  There's one in a kimono in the ring and five sitting on each side of the square (one side has two).  Yes, sometimes the wrestlers fall on the judges!  It's okay - they're big guys themselves, so they can take it.  We also found out why they have blankets over their legs.  Sometimes the dirt is kicked into their laps.  There are also two other judges in an overhead video room, who communicate by radio to one of the judges on the floor.  It's just like college football - referees everywhere!

gyoji in the ring

The gyoji in the ring is the one who makes the official decision, but any of the judges can question it.  They then have a mono-ii (a conference) to discuss it.  If the decision is overturned, it's considered a black mark on the judge in the ring.  We saw four mono-ii, and I think only once did they vote to overturn the decision.  Sometimes they decide it's too close to call, and the wrestlers have a rematch.

mono-ii - you can see the one judge talking to the judges in the video booth

Having fun at the stadium!

Even though it looks about the same to me, there are 82 different winning techniques (kimarite) to the sumo bout.  Only about six of them are regularly used, though. My favorite is at the very start of the bout one wrestler jumps up as the other goes to attack.  The attacking wrestler is off balance and touches the ground with his hands.  If the wrestler's opponent steps out of the ring or touches the ground with anything other than the bottom of his feet, he wins. 

The dohyo is swept and straightened out between bouts.

Dohyo-iri

The upper level divisions start with a "parade" of the wrestlers (dohyo-iri).  The skirts they wear (kesho-mawashi) may advertise a product of the sponsor of the wrestler.  If it's a foreigner, the skirt might have a picture of his home country's flag.  Interestingly, in 2002 a rule was made allowing only one foreigner per stable. (Stable is the word used to describe where the sumo wrestlers train and live - the stables are like a team.  There are 44 stables.)  Apparently, too many foreigners were winning the tournaments!

No, really, we find it very interesting!  This is probably during a transition between wrestlers.

Ha!  We can take pictures of Steve, too.  He snuck down to a lower level to get some more close-up pictures.

Sumo selfie!

As with everything in Japan, all parts of the ceremony, clothes, etc, etc have specific meanings.  I have lots of fun looking up all the elements of sumo, but it's probably too much detail to go into here!

People wait outside the stadium to see the sumo wrestlers as they leave. I feel like we attended a special event!

Sumo wrestler groupies!