Sakahoko Nobushige

Background

Sakahoko made his professional debut in January 1978, joining Izutsu stable, which was run by his father, ex sekiwake Tsurugamine.

Career

His highest rank was sekiwake. He is now the head coach of Izutsu stable. He is the elder brother of Terao Tsunefumi.

Sakahoko made his debut in the top makuuchi division in November 1982.

He reached what was to be his highest rank of sekiwake for the first time in July 1984. This was his first ever tournament in the titled san"yaku ranks and somewhat unusually for a san"yaku debutant he was able to produce a winning score (kachi-koshi) of 8-7.

In March 1985 Sakahoko"s younger brother Terao joined him in makuuchi. They were the first pair of brothers to be in the top division simultaneously since Tanikaze and Tatsugesake 200 years before.

In July 1989, troubled by a shoulder injury, he turned in a disastrous 2-13 record and was demoted to the maegashira ranks.

He managed to return to komusubi for one tournament in November 1990 but fell to jūryō in 1992 and announced his retirement that September at the age of 31 after 14 years in sumo. (Terao competed for another ten years, until September 2002). Sakahoko stayed in the sumo world as an elder of the Japan Sumo Association under the toshiyori name of Kasagayama.

In 1994, when his father retired, he became Izutsu Oyakata and took over the running of Izutsu stable.

Izutsu also works as a shinpan or judge of tournament bouts. He was well known for favouring the grip on the mawashi with both arms inside the opponent"s, called moro-zashi.

His most common winning kimarite was overwhelmingly yori-kiri or force out, which accounted for over half his victories at sekitori level

Achievements

• He received the Technique prize for his efforts. In September 1987 he defeated two yokozuna, Chiyonofuji and Futahaguro, and was awarded the Outstanding Performance prize. He was promoted back to sekiwake and proceeded to hold the rank for a then record nine successive tournaments from November 1987 until March 1989, but he was never under consideration for promotion to ōzeki as he could not achieve regular double figure scores, his best result being 9-6. The stable currently has one makuuchi wrestler, Kakuryū, who has surpassed Sakahoko and his father′s achievements by reaching the rank of yokozuna in March 2014.