Tamawashi Ichirō

Early life and sumo background

In Mongolia, Batjargal was working toward a career in the hotel industry, but was encouraged to come to Japan by his older sister who was studying there. On a visit to see his sister in Japan, they went to Ryōgoku where Tokyo's official tournaments are held. They happened to wander by Izutsu stable and had a chance to meet the up-and-coming Mongolian sumo wrestler for that stable, Kakuryū. They talked about the prospects of Batjargal joining a stable and Kakuryū put him in touch with former senior Mongolian sumo wrestler Kyokushūzan. Through this connection, he was recruited by the former sekiwake Tamanofuji and joined Kataonami stable in January 2004.

Career

He made steady progress through the lower divisions, recording only one make-koshi (more losses than wins) on the way to the third highest makushita division in May 2005. He went up and down the division until taking the championship or yūshō in September 2007 with a perfect 7-0 record, which sent him up the ranks to makushita 2. A 4-3 record in the next tournament was enough to earn him promotion to the elite sekitori ranks for the January 2008 tournament.

After producing four consecutive kachi-koshi (more wins than losses) scores in the jūryō division, Tamawashi made his debut in the top makuuchi division in September 2008. A 4-11 record sent him back to jūryō but a 10-5 score in November returned him immediately to makuuchi. His first winning score in the top division in March 2009 saw him at his highest rank to date of maegashira 8 in the May 2009 tournament. However, he could only manage a 5-10 score at maegashira 11 in July, and was demoted back to jūryō, replaced by Masatsukasa. However, he responded by taking the jūryō championship with an 11-4 record in September, which returned him immediately to the top division. In the November 2009 tournament he produced his best top division score so far of 10-5, which saw him promoted to maegashira 7 for the January 2010 tourney. Another kachi-koshi score of 8-7 saw him promoted to a new highest rank of maegashira 4. He was however unable to defeat any of his san'yaku opponents and had slipped back to maegashira 14 by July 2010. He responded with scores of 10-5 and 9-6 in the next two tournaments, earning him promotion to maegashira 3.

Tamawashi defeated Harumafuji in the January 2011 tournament, his first victory over an ōzeki, but finished with a 5-10 record. The tournament ended on an embarrassing note for him when he injured his right arm by leaning against and breaking the window of a restaurant in Tokyo. He had been on a night out drinking following the final day's action, and was given a stiff warning by the Sumo Association. The injury did not affect his participation in the next tournament, which did not take place until May. However, after recording four consecutive make-koshi he dropped down to jūryō in January 2012. He made an immediate return to makuuchi for the March tournament, but fell back to jūryō on two further occasions, in September 2012 and May 2013. He has since achieved enough wins in tournaments to remain a fixture in the middle ranks of makuuchi.

In March 2015 he somewhat fortuitously won promotion to the san'yaku ranks for the first time, going straight to komusubi from the relatively low rank of maegashira 9 after most of the wrestlers above him made losing scores. It took him 66 tournaments from his professional debut to reach sanyaku, the slowest ever for a foreign-born wrestler. He was unable to hold on to the rank for more than a single tournament, but In May 2015 he earned his first gold star or kinboshi for an upset of a yokozuna, defeating Harumafuji. (He was also the slowest to earn a kinboshi among foreign-born wrestlers.) 2015 was the first year in his top division career that he was ranked above maegashira 10 for the whole year.

Tamawashi returned to the komusubi rank in November 2016 and produced a career-best performance as he recorded ten wins including another victory over Harumafuji and wins over three of the four ōzeki. He was rewarded with his first special prize for Technique, becoming the first wrestler since Asashoryu in 2001 to win his first special prize while ranked in san'yaku and was promoted to a career-high rank of sekiwake. The 77 career tournaments it took him to reach sekiwake is the fifth slowest in sumo history. He is the first sekiwake from Kataonami stable since Tamanoshima in January 2004, and the first produced by the current stablemaster, the former Tamakasuga, since he took over in February 2010.

Fighting style

Unusually for a Mongolian wrestler Tamawashi is an oshi-sumo specialist, who prefers pushing and thrusting techniques. His most common winning kimarite is overwhelmingly oshidashi (push out), which accounts for half his career wins. He is not comfortable fighting on the mawashi, winning only 15 bouts by yorikiri (force out) in his career to date.