Sumo stables housed in older structures becoming rare sight

The Mongolian veteran went into the September 2019 tournament as defending champion, with his 14-1 title winning performance in the previous meet seemingly the sign of a late career resurgence.

But while Kakuryu did come close to a seventh championship in March this year — just losing out in a final day loss to Hakuho — he has also missed 63 of 75 bouts in the five other tournaments held since that last Emperor’s Cup win.

Things outside the ring haven’t been much better for the Ulaanbaatar native.

Kakuryu began the naturalization process for Japanese citizenship in 2018, but difficulties in obtaining the required paperwork from his home country means that were he to retire now, the yokozuna would be forced to leave sumo entirely, as only Japanese nationals are allowed possess elder stock.

Further bad news came this week with the announcement that demolition of Izutsu stable was getting underway Wednesday.

While “heya” or “beya” literally mean “room,” when it comes to sumo, “stable” has long been the standard translation. This of course conforms to the customary use of stable as a collective noun for sporting teams housed together, whether they be human (boxers), animal (horses) or machine (cars). Scuderia (stable) Ferrari of course manages to combine all three, having human drivers in a car with a horse logo.

Izutsu Beya (the collection of wrestlers, referees and ring announcers among others) hasn’t existed since 2019, but the building that held them still stood as of this week.

From his arrival in Japan as a teenager in 2001, Kakuryu spent almost two decades living and training in that very building, so it’s no surprise that the yokozuna was emotional this week when telling journalists its demolition felt like losing his own home, and that he would carry its memories with him forever.

Given that the structure was one of the more run-down in the sport, its razing hardly comes as a surprise, however.