I have been meaning to post this for awhile in the 'Other sports', but I figured I may be the only one with any interest in this sport. We'll see how it goes and depending on how much interest there is I will keep posting stuff and we can chat about results.
Here is the basics:
1) There are six tournaments (basho) per year:
January - Tokyo
March - Osaka
May - Tokyo
Jul - Nagoya
Sep - Tokyo
Nov - Fukuoka
Since I live in Fukuoka I always attend the Nov tournament. Have also just recently been to the Tokyo basho this month.
2) There are 6 divisions in Sumo, 4 of them are amateur and 2 are professional (Juryo and Makuuchi being the highest division). Rikishi (wrestlers) in Juryo and Makuuchi are known as 'sekitori' - paid Rikishi.
3) Juryo guys try to fight there way to Makuuchi and Makuuchi guys try to avoid going down to Juryo.
4) Each tournament has 15 days. It starts on a Sunday and finished 2 Sunday's later going every day.
5) You move up the rankings with 8 or more wins (known as a Kachikoshi), you move down in rank with 8 ore more losses (known as a Makkekoshi). The more wins or losses you have magnifies how much you go up or go down. For example, 8-7 winning record means you go up, but not very much. Similary 7-8 losing record means you go down, but not too much. 10-5 winnig record bumps you up a fair deal where as 5-10 can send you right out of the division depending on where your rank is when that happens.
6) In Makuuchi there are 5 categories of ranking. Maegashira is the rank and file category. Komusubi is the first rank in a lucrative group of rankings known as Sanyaku. The other Sanyaku ranks are Sekiwake, Ozeki and finally Yokozuna. Sanyaku Rikishi have much higher pay days in their bouts.
7) Sekitori Rikishi are currently about 60% Japanese. The other 40% are Mongolian (making up the biggest part of that percentage), Chinese, Russian, Egyptian, Bulgarian, Brazilian and Georgian.
That's the first things I can think of to get started. There is of course much much more!
Recently, history was made. Yokozuna Hakuho won his 33rd yusho - a new record and a record that no one thought could be beat. Yokozuna Taiho won 32 bashos before retiriing in the early 70's.
http://www.japantimes.co.jp/sports/2.../#.VMX3b_7F-So
Here are some pics from when I went to Day 13 in Tokyo:
Best site to check out for Sumo (in English):
http://www.sumo.or.jp/en/index
Next date to keep an eye out for is Feb 23 - this is when they will update the Banzuke (Rikishi rankings) ahead of the Osaka basho which starts Mar 8!
The SUMO Thread!
