Gyoji

Jungyo Newsreel, Day 9

Herouth Jungyo (巡業) , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

Continuing with my intermittent reporting… The Jungyo finished its first leg, which consisted of winding its way back from Nagoya to Tokyo. The rikishi had one day off in their heya or homes, and then gathered back at the Tachikawa Tachihi Arena in Tokyo, where we land today.

Three of these nobori are for absent rikishi: Tochinoshin, Takakeisho, Goeido
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Natsu 2018 Jungyo Newsreel – Day 24

Herouth Jungyo (巡業) , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

🌐 Location: Odawara, Kanagawa

nobori

The Jungyo is nearing its end, but this doesn’t mean that all troubles are over. Hakuho started the day in Kanagawa, but didn’t finish it there. His left ankle – an injury that accompanied his knee injury – started aching again, and he left the event for Tokyo, to have fluid drawn from it, and hopefully be able to return to action.

Even if he does return for the two remaining days, this is a worrying situation for him. Two days ago, he cranked up his training regime a little, adding some on-dohyo workout and a bout. And immediately, that ankle started acting up. The basho is approaching fast, and he needs to get himself in shape or be kyujo yet again.

He did notify the jungyo masters in time, so his name did not appear in today’s torikumi list.

So let’s go on with the event. First, a reminder that the Jungyo consists not only of rikishi, but also of many others – yobidashi, gyoji, tokoyama, shimpan, . So here is gyoji Kimura Kindayu:

In his street cloths
In full regalia

Much fan attention was given to this foursome:

four-muscle-men

The calisthenics trio from a couple of days ago recruited a fourth member – Chiyonoumi. Here trying to strike a pose. The newcomer is still getting to know the ropes, but the others know the drill. Hokutofuji shows off his ginormous traps. And biceps. And pecs. Whoa. Enho also has nice shoulders but is a little more bashful about striking poses. And Tobizaru doesn’t miss an opportunity to show off.

And I do mean – doesn’t miss an opportunity:

The four continued their synchronized exercises with a form of fast shiko which I’m sure got all the demons and evil spirits in Kanagawa soil to pack up and seek asylum in some other prefecture:

I’m amused by the lonely tsukebito just ignoring them and doing his slow, standard shiko at his own pace.

The four also exercised in turns with a rubber band:

Hokutofuji supported by his tsukebito:

Tobizaru supported by Hokutofuji. I shuddered to think what would have happened if this was not Hokutofuji but Hakuho:

Which may explain why Enho looked so apprehensive when he tried it:

apprehensive-enho

Though I must say that he then trusted Tobizaru with the straps, which is something I wouldn’t do:

enho-trusting-tobizaru

Then again, if I were standing next to a stall selling Tendon, I wouldn’t be pulling any rubber band at all (unless they were preventing me from approaching the stall).

This troop was not the only combo exercising at the edges of the arena. Here are Takakeisho and Daieisho. Takakeisho seems to be in high spirits. Perhaps because he doesn’t have his stablemaster getting intimate with his mawashi knot anymore.

Things get serious (well, as serious as things can get when accompanied by a high school band playing “YMCA”) once Takakeisho slips Daieisho a slap to the face. Takakeisho also thinks it’s a good idea to smash his opponent against the door. Daieisho, however, seems to be enjoying himself immensely.

On the dohyo, Onosho is consulting with Aminishiki about something:

Takanosho got a really lengthy butsukari session from Goeido today. Not sure how he earned all that love:

It didn’t end there. At some point Goeido takes a break and gets a sip of water, and Akiseyama and Yago hurriedly wipe and tidy the exhausted Takanosho:

Kakuryu practiced with Shodai. Shodai looks pretty frustrated:

Here is a bit of today’s shokkiri. I’ve shown you a lot of shokkiri already, but I find it amusing when the gyoji gets deeply into “character”. Here you see the standard lead up to the “fists are forbidden”, and Kimura Satoshi starts to fan himself with his gunbai and turns his back to the pair as the fight breaks. They then start yelling at him to do his job already.

Let’s move on to some torikumi. Starting with the lower ranks:

Jonidan – Arikawa vs. Adachi. These two are amazingly tenacious for a Jungyo bout:

Here is Shinohara vs. Chiyootori at Makushita. Shinohara tries a hassotobi (a flying leap). Chiyootori makes him take a flying leap alright:

Two can play this game…

And this was not the last hassotobi of the day. You know who does it again… and again… and again… And by coincidence, it’s attempted against the other one of the Kinoshita brothers. This bout between Ishiura and Chiyomaru really needs the Yaketi Sax accompaniment. If it didn’t involve two sekitori in their shimekomi I’d have sworn this was shokkiri:

But it isn’t. Chiyomaru sees he is becoming the butt of a joke, so he uses his very formidable pair of glutei maximi. The joke is now on Ishiura. The kimarite, by the way, is ushiromotare – “Lean backwards”. It’s a fairly recent kimarite, which was introduced into the top division by Takamisakari (“Robocop”), though I don’t think he did it quite as comically.

I don’t have the video, but I’m informed that Aoiyama has beaten Ryuden by a very decisive tsuridashi. He’s immitating his heya mate?

Here is Shodai vs. Kaisei:

Now, when they pair Tamawashi with Shohozan, you know you’re not going to get any comedy. What you get is a saloon brawl, including defiant stares and whatnot:

Ooh, there’s some fight club action going on there. And it ends in a monoii. It’s not clear who got out first, and the shimpan do not have the benefit of a video room in the Jungyo. So it’s a torinaoshi:

Ooh, the brawl continues! By this time, the Yokozuna and Ozeki arrive for the kore-yori-sanyaku, and you can see they, too, are being well entertained by this bout:

amused-tochinoshin

Apropos Tochinoshin, he got into the news coverage of this event.

You can see him doing fansa for the children on summer vacation who came to the event (instead of doing their homework). He says that his toe is improving, but still hurts, and adds that he is full of spirits for the coming basho. He later adds that because of his kadoban his first aim is a kachi-koshi, of course, but then he aims at reaching double figures again.

In this same video you can also see his bout with Goeido. Yet another tsuridashi.

Finally, here is your musubi-no-ichiban, and Kakuryu seems to have shifted his gear into Yokozuna drive:

OK, just in case you didn’t get your fill of Enho with those earlier exercises:

enho

 

Natsu 2018 Jungyo Newsreel – Day 15

Herouth Jungyo (巡業) , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

🌐 Location: Sendai, Miyagi

arena-inside

Today’s event… well, honestly, it’s not today’s event. It took place on the 12th. But anyway, day 15th event took place at Sendai, Miyagi prefecture. Sendai has been one of the places hit most severely in the 2011 Tohoku disaster, and sever years later, it’s still seeking revival. Accordingly, two Yokozuna with their entourages reported in to perform a ceremonial dohyo-iri for the revival of Sendai:

If you’re wondering about the absence of Hakuho, just remember that in 2011 he did the rounds as lone Yokozuna to perform dohyo-iri all over Tohoku, including Sendai. The other Yokozuna get to be in the spotlight this time.

The event also included some solemn sumo jinku:

jinku-for-restoration-of-sendai
Tochigidake, Mutsukaze, Motokiyama

Back in the venue, Hakuho continued his off-dohyo workout routine. Though who knows what he was exercising here:

hakuho

If you think that looks silly, that’s one Hakuho record easily broken by Kakuryu, who seems to be really creative when it comes to looking silly:

kakuryu-silly-exercise

Other than that, most practice was sane. Takakeisho was doing butsukari with Daieisho:

takakeisho-butsukari-daieisho

And Takayasu was doing san-ban with Yutakayama:

takayasu-sanban-yutakayama

Goeido also had gave butsukari, but was still off the torikumi. Apparently, he has an ear infection. Takekaze, by the way, is back in the bouts.

Just before the Juryo torikumi, a drum exhibition took place:

Here is another duty performed by gyoji: the announcer in the venue is always a gyoji. In this case, Kimura Ryosuke:

ryosuke-chiyootori

Here accompanied by Chiyootori, who seems never to let go of that portable mini-fan.

It’s the announcer’s duty to explain what is going on on the dohyo – who is coming up for sanban or butsukari, what performance is about to take place and what it means. He gives the audience the kimarite at the end of each bout, reads out the names of kensho sponsors, and also gives general guidelines such as what to do in case of earthquake.

Dohyo-iri time is goof time. Chiyomaru decided to make sure all the photos taken by the sumo ladies were decent:

chiyomaru-self-censored
I wonder how he got those removed (cringe)

Tamawashi and Chiyomaru bullied poor Shodai so badly he ran away:

Tamawashi didn’t settle just with that. He also pestered Ikioi:

tamawashi-annoys-ikioi

…and bothered Kagayaki:

tamawashi-annoys-kagayaki

I guess somebody forgot his Ritalin today?

Alas, I do not have any torikumi videos. I can inform you that Aminishiki, who is very popular in Sendai, won his bout vs. Takanoiwa:

aminishiki
That’s a pretty determined face for a mere Jungyo bout

Apparently, Chiyomaru lost to Arawashi, while Mitakeumi beat Takayasu. And honestly, I don’t know who won, but Endo seems to be really enjoying his bouts:

endo-enjoys-himself-too-much

Now, in our Enho corner, I wanted to give you yet another solo dreamy prince photo. Or maybe one of him doing his shiko. But I have been informed that there are still a few people not trained enough to recognize Yago on the spot. So I give you Enho – accompanied by Yago:

enho-with-yago

Easily recognizable by having his center of gravity in his jaw.

And so as not to diminish Enho, here is a little clip from Instagram, which shows you why people love the little prince to bits. He recognizes the lady fan who is filming this from a previous occasion, and turns to greet her. She: “Hey, you remember me?”, He: “Yes, I remember”. She “Oh… thank you!!!” 😍

That guy waiting for Enho there is Kyokusoten, who has also fallen under the spell of the little pixie prince. Just today I saw a tweet in which he refers to him as “Uchi no Enho” (“My Enho”). 💕