I’m having a cold. Since last Monday I’ve had the sniffles, with a bit of temperature even in the evening. I know exactly what caused it, and looking back: It was worth it!
Last Sunday I spent 7 hours sitting in a rather unheated event hall in Osaka watching the first day of this year’s Spring Tournament of Sumo. It was rather unplanned, a friend of a friend bought the wrong tickets and couldn’t find anyone else to go with her, so we were four girls sitting high up there above the ring to watch sumo. Before entering the hall at about 11 in the morning, we bought food and drinks to last all day, and then we hunkered down and enjoyed the show.
A sumo tournament lasts for two weeks, and every rikishi or sumo ringer has one match a day. The ranking after the tournament is determined by the number of wins each rikishi could score, and there are very complicated rules as to how and when to move up to the next level. I guess I’ll write about sumo in more depth in a Sunday post some day.
This was my second sumo event (I saw one in Nagoya some 8 years ago or so), and there were essentially three parts to the whole day. The lowest ranking rikishi start wrestling in the morning – the tournament was well under way when we arrived – and the last match of the day in the late afternoon is always the one of the yokozuna, the top ranked rikishi.
It may sound a bit funny, but you can actually notice a difference in the matches. The lower ranks seem to be more different in fighting strength, so many of the early matches are over very quickly, with one rikishi clearly dominant. The higher the rank, the more even the pairs, and a match takes much longer, including of course the going into the ring and clearing it with salt, the foot stamping etc. which is sometimes repeated several times before the match really starts.
It’s also not always true that the bigger fighter with more fat wins, often the not so fat ones are more muscular or agile and can thus make up for a lack of sheer body mass. Nevertheless, no matter what their size, sumo wrestlers are in a very good shape – or could you lift your foot over your head like the two guys in the picture above?
Altogether, I had a fun day last Sunday, and I gladly paid for it with the cold I caught (even though I could use a good night’s sleep by now).The greatest bit happened at the very last match when the yokozuna lost… This is always a big disappointment for the spectators, and they show it. Enjoy!
(This 2013 video is a bit loud in the beginning, but sound is not necessary for the fun part. In January 2017, Kisenosato became the first Japanese yokozuna in 19 years. He’s the one winning the fight in the video.)