3 Fil-Japanese throw weight around in sumo

In the rough-and-tumble world of sumo, at least three heavyweights compete with Filipino blood running in their veins: Akira Takayasu, Masunoyama Tomoharu, and Mitakaeumi Hisashi.

Among the three, it is Takayasu who stands out although Mitakeumi Hisashi is not far behind.

Takayasu, a 6-1 400-lb grappler from Ibaraki whose father Eiji is Japanese and mother Bebelita is from Bohol, holds the highest rank as ozeki, a status just below sumo's most coveted title: Yokozuna.

The 28-year-old formally received the title last year and his feat did not escape the attention of the Philippine Embassy in Tokyo which held a ceremony to honor one of Japan's fastestrising wrestlers.

"If you had told me when I entered sumo that I would become an ozeki, I think I'd have been very surprised," Takatasu told the Japanese media.

Takayasu's first love was baseball, according to the elder Takayasu and the young Akira "didn't like studying very much, but loved sports far more than most."

"Takayasu joined a little league baseball team in fourth grade, and spent three years in his junior high school's baseball club, playing catcher. He thought that he would be behind the plate for a high school club as well, but changed course after Eiji strongly advised he take up sumo," the article said.

"By his third year of junior high, Takayasu was already over 180 centimeters tall and weighed more than 120 kilograms. Eiji looked at his son's body type and was taken by its similarity to that of fellow Ibaraki Prefecture native Kisenosato, who had been steadily climbing the sumo ranks (and is now a yokozuna). In another coincidence, Kisenosato had also played baseball for his junior high school."