Dohyo Disciple

Once an everyday sumo fan, Member Ryan Goldstein is now a patron of a wrestlers’ stable.

The young sumo wrestler braces himself as his enormous stablemate barrels into his chest, driving him across the dirt floor of the dohyo practice ring like a football tackling sled.

After four hours of practice, the behemoth of a man grimaces in pain, his mawashi belt and legs caked in soil, steam swirling off his heaving, sweaty shoulders.

“You literally dedicate your life [to sumo] at a young age,” says Club Member Ryan Goldstein, a sponsor of the Sadogatake sumo stable. “And there is no off-season. Practice is year-round.”

The teenage wrestlers practicing this rainy, spring morning in Matsudo, Chiba, sleep 10 to a room. After practice, they sweep the ring with straw brooms, wax and comb their elders’ topknots and wait by their side during lunch, making sure their bowls never empty.

These apprentices of the ring will not attend college. Instead, they hope to emulate stablemate Kotoshogiku, who in January became the first Japanese wrestler to win a grand tournament, or basho, in more than 10 years in a sport dominated by Mongolian-born athletes.

“[Kotoshogiku’s achievement] is an inspiration to other Japanese wrestlers,” says Sadogatake stable master Kotonowaka Terumasa. “They can be next.”

Goldstein, 44, who celebrated the traditional banzai three cheers with Kotoshogiku after his victory, was once watching tournaments from the cheap seats at Tokyo’s Ryogoku sumo arena.

While studying at Waseda University on a research scholarship in the early 1990s, Goldstein would line up at 6am to buy ¥1,500 same-day tickets. When he couldn’t make it to Ryogoku, he watched the action on TV at the nearest electronics store.

“The more you learn, the more you realize the strategy involved,” says the Chicago native, who also sponsors professional boxers and co-owns a Japanese basketball team. “In a short period of time, there is a chess match going on. When you know the guys and you know the strategy, it’s much more interesting.”

As the likes of sumo legends—and rivals—Akebono and Takanohana helped inspire a sumo boom in the early ’90s, Goldstein was drawn to Kotonowaka, an underdog from Sadogatake stable.

When Goldstein returned to Japan seven years ago, the lawyer became a patron of the Sadogatake stable, eventually celebrating sake toasts with wrestlers and treating them to steak dinners at CHOP Steakhouse.

After the morning practice, Goldstein kneels next to Kotonowaka, the wrestler he used to cheer on from the back rows of Ryogoku, and shares a traditional sumo lunch of the protein-rich chankonabe stew.

“I like the dignity of the sport. [Sumo wrestlers] show humility in all aspects of their life,” says Goldstein. “And the sport hasn’t changed in 400 years. It’s like stepping back into Japanese history.”

For details on tickets for May’s summer grand sumo tournament, check Here.

Words Nick Narigon
Image Yuuki Ide