Wakanohana III
| Wakanohana Masaru | |
|---|---|
| 若乃花 勝 | |
Wakanohana's handprint displayed on a monument in Ryōgoku, Tokyo
|
|
| Personal information | |
| Born | Masaru Hanada January 20, 1971 Suginami, Tokyo, Japan |
| Height | 1.80 m (5 ft 11 in) |
| Weight | 134 kg (295 lb; 21.1 st) |
| Career | |
| Stable | Futagoyama |
| Record | 573-286-133 |
| Debut | March, 1988 |
| Highest rank | Yokozuna (May, 1998) |
| Retired | March, 2000 |
| Championships | 5 (Makuuchi) 1 (Jūryō) 1 (Sandanme) 1 (Jonokuchi) |
| Special Prizes | Outstanding Performance (3) Technique (6) |
| Gold Stars | 2 (Asahifuji) |
| * Up to date as of August 2007. | |
Masaru Hanada (花田 勝 Hanada Masaru?, born January 20, 1971) is a Japanese former sumo wrestler. As an active wrestler he was known as Wakanohana III Masaru (若乃花 勝), and his rise through the ranks alongside his younger brother Takanohana Kōji saw a boom in sumo's popularity in the early 1990s. He is the elder son of the former ōzeki Takanohana I, who was also his stablemaster, and the nephew of Wakanohana I, a famous yokozuna of the 1950s. Wakanohana was a long serving ōzeki who won five tournament championships, and eventually joined his brother at yokozuna rank in 1998, creating the first ever sibling grand champions. After a brief and injury plagued yokozuna career he retired in 2000, becoming a television personality and restaurant owner. The death of his father in 2005 saw a very public falling out with his brother.
He entered sumo in March 1988, at the same time as his younger brother Takanohana, and joined his father's training stable, then known as Fujishima stable. The two brothers moved out of the family quarters and joined all the other new recruits in the communal area, and were instructed to refer to their father as oyakata (coach) only. Future rivals Akebono and Kaiō also made their professional debuts in the same month. In the early part of his career he wrestled under the name Wakahanada, being given his uncle's fighting name a few tournaments prior to his promotion to ōzeki. Wakanohana literally means young flower in Japanese.
He entered the top division for the first time in September 1990, alongside Akebono and Takatōriki. He first reached a san'yaku rank in November 1991 when he was promoted to komusubi. In January 1992 he defeated Asahifuji in what was to be the yokozuna's last ever bout, to earn the second of his two kinboshi or gold stars. Lacking his brother's weight and strength, he took longer than Takanohana to rise up the ranks, still being a maegashira wrestler as late as January 1993, the tournament that Takanohana earned promotion to ōzeki. However in the following tournament he won his first top division championship or yūshō with a 14-1 record. After a 10-5 in May 1993 and runner-up honours in July, he joined his brother at ōzeki rank, the first time that two brothers had been ranked at ōzeki simultaneously. His second tournament title came in November 1995, when he defeated Takanohana (by then a yokozuna) in a playoff. This was to be the only time he fought his brother in a competitive match. He was injured in the next tournament however, and the same thing happened after his third championship in January 1997. On that occasion he missed two tournaments and only just preserved his ōzeki status with a bare majority of wins upon his return in July 1997. He was a tournament runner-up on five occasions at ōzeki rank, four of those coming in 1996. Due to the dominance of Futagoyama stable, he was excused from having to fight several top wrestlers such as Takanonami, Takatōriki and Akinoshima.
...
Wikipedia