Sumo’s latest group of new recruits all passed the physical examinations that were held at Tokyo's Ryogoku Kokugikan this week.
While wrestlers with collegiate sumo backgrounds have been dominating headlines over the past couple of years, the newest batch of aspiring stars has a much more traditional flavor.
Among the eight young men who are joining professional sumo for the January tournament, only one — Lucas Kazuo Iima — comes from a post-secondary institution, and even then the 23-year-old was a rugby player, not a sumo wrestler, at Nagoya University of Economics.