Before writing this post I knew absolutely nothing about Sumo, however I have done some researching and as per usual I will write my understanding and you will (hopefully) enjoy it and share it on (hint hint; share it on..)
Before we start an interesting fact, Wrestler in Japanese is "Rikishi"
That might cause a light bulb to go off with a few folk.
The interesting looking guy above is your stereotypical Sumo Wrestler. Sumo wrestlers (would you believe) live a very regimented life, they require a very strict diet and even worse living conditions.
I say living conditions loosely, what I mean by that is how they are expected to live, not necessarily the conditions in which they live.. (It's all a bit confusing right now, but bare with me - I'll explain)
Your typical Sumo would start training at 5am every morning and train for around 2/3 hours. Training would consist of many different exercises and spars (I assume - but I have no plans on becoming a sumo wrestler so I didn't really research how they train)
By the time 8am rolls around (rolls, ha, no pun intended)..
Anyway, by the time 8am rolls around the sumo wrestlers are ready to prepare what is known as Chanko. Chanko is the name given to the foods eaten by Sumo Wrestlers.
Here is an example of Chanko;
Looks pretty appetizing right?
Consider this, Chanko is usually made up of;
Chicken, fish, Beef, Noodles, Rice, Vegetables and a soup broth.
Still not too bad, I agree, however that one bowl you see up there is actually enough to feed two people (roughly, it's a pretty big bowl)
A sumo wrestler would never have just one bowl of that, they would be eating in stupidly large quantities and any left over (which I doubt happens much) will be used as a broth to make more the next day.
So, you think it sounds nice, Imagine eating 3/4 bowls of that for breakfast..
After that I'm guessing the sumo doesn't really do that much, who would?
So the next part of Sumo Wrestling - To our right we can see what is called a "Dohyo"
You should be able to pronounce that if you
read the last post "Hirigana Lesson" ;)
So the dohyo is... a ring.
A ring made from rice straw bales.. I just get the feeling that there is a little too much rice in japan..
But hey, they work with it, and my god it works well. (That'll be talked about more when I discuss food at a later date)
Anyway I've gone off track the dohyo ring is made from rice straw bales and is roughly 5m in diameter.
Usually mounted on a base platform of clay, then covered in sand.
Inside the ring are two white lines, these are called Shikiri-Sen. I believe they are just used to determine the wrestlers starting positions.
Around the outside of the ring is very very fine sand refered to as Snakes eye (ja-no-me). As the sand is so fine it allows the referee to determine whether a wrestler has placed any part of his body outside the ring.
Which leads me on to how it is played.. (is played the right word to use? who knows..)
The idea of Sumo is very simple (as with every sport there are 100's of different rules that I suppose you pick up the more you watch/partake)
You start in your starting positions, which you know are behind the Shikiri-Sen.
The aim is to do one of two things;
Either force your opponent to touch the ground with any part of their body other than the souls of their feet
Or to force your opponent to step out of the ring.
That's it, that's how you partake in sumo.
Of course there is so much more to it, but as far as actually playing a match (again that doesn't sound right, can you play a match of sumo?) It's very simple.
Matches often last only a few seconds, but are then followed by Ritual Ceremonies and the likes.
I have included a video below of some Sumo Wrestling highlights I found on YouTube.
Enjoy it, and I hope you feel you have learned something today. I certainly have.
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Until Next time..
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