As some of you may have seen in the comments to the post about Kisenosato’s Kumamoto dohyo-iri, Ura is doing keiko again and trying to work his way to the Kyushu basho.

This news item is official (as in “appeared in the recognized sports press“). Here is the gist of that article:

On November 3rd, Ura has participated in moshiai-geiko with members of Sandanme and Jonidan, for about 10 bouts, wearing a brace on his injured knee covered with a regular knee supporter. It turns out it has been his second day training.

Following the moshiai, he removed the supporter and brace, and with his knee merely taped he followed up with light butsukari, offering his chest to lower-level rikishi. However, he could be seen limping outside the dohyo.

Ura’s response to reporters’ question has been laconic, mainly “I myself don’t know yet how it will turn out”. His stablemaster seemed to worry that Ura might injure himself again, but said that “It’s not that he can’t do sumo at all. I’ll leave the decision to the man himself”.

Tweets since that story, and the above picture which is from Ikioi’s blog, tell us that Ura continues to practice – mostly that light butsukari with lower level wrestlers.

My personal opinion is that this is horrible news. It means that Ura is not following the standard procedure for ACL tears, and may be on the path to permanent damage to his career as well as his health.

Reminder: the ACL tear diagnosis was official, confirmed by his stablemaster on September 28th following MRI exam.

One of those same tweets had some better news regarding Ikioi and Ichinojo. Those who followed the summer Jungyo may recall that Ikioi was kyujo from most of it (but returned near the end) because of a bulging disc, for which he was prescribed a diet and advised to strengthen the muscles around the problem area. Ichinojo went kyujo from the Jungyo just about when Ikioi returned, due to a hernia of an undisclosed type.

The tweet in question said that those two, in contrast to Ura, had an excellent, powerful training (apparently they engaged each other).

Another bit of news from the practice grounds in Fukuoka has to do with Enho.

There is still no official word of what happened to his foot (and the photo above is only of his upper body), but a tweet I saw today seemed to offer some encouraging news:

稽古終わり間近、白鵬が炎鵬を呼んで白鵬が胸を出したんですけど、必死の形相で何度もぶつかる炎鵬にちょいウルッとなって。
白鵬も炎鵬になんか優しいようにかんじたなー…

炎鵬足はnoテーピングで大丈夫だったということかなぁ…

— いりまり (@mmmm4649mmmm) November 2, 2017

My translation is, more or less:

“After keiko was over I was nearby when Hakuho called Enho and offered him his chest [for butsukari], but seeing Enho clashing into him again and again with a desparate look seemed to bring him near to tears. I felt that Hakuho was feeling empathy for Enho.

I suppose the fact that Enho had no taping on his foot means that it’s OK?”

So, what I make of it is that Enho is not taped up, and may be in passable condition to fight. But Hakuho may be worried about something in his performance.