Wakanohana Masaru
| Wakanohana Masaru | |
|---|---|
| 若乃花 勝 | |
Wakanohana's handprint displayed on a monument in Ryōgoku, Tokyo
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| 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.
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