London will host just the second-ever professional Sumo wrestling event outside of Japan next October.
The Grand Sumo Tournament will take place at the Royal Albert Hall in partnership with the Japan Sumo Association, Nihon Sumo Kyokai, to help mark its centenary.
The only previous occasion when Sumo has been hosted professionally overseas was in 1991, when the same venue staged a five-day “basho” before a sold-out crowd and which was broadcast nationally in the UK.
After a 34-year wait, London will again play host to Japan’s national sport.
“Good things come to those who wait,” the Royal Albert Hall’s chief executive, James Ainscough OBE, told the PA news agency.
“We’ve tried a number of times but various things have got in the way, not least Covid.
“We have our own timetable of shows here, Sumo tournaments in Japan have their own rhythm, so finding a moment for our timetable and their rhythm to coincide has taken this long.
“But we’re absolutely thrilled to be bringing it back in 2025.”
The 1991 event, staged as part of that year’s Japan Festival in London, was a technical feat for organisers.
Wheelbarrows were used to transport specialist soil to Kensington in west London from a site in Heathrow, while adaptations had to be made to the stage area to ensure it could bear the impact of the competitors as they wrestled.
“The fact they’ve chosen to come back when they could have gone to any capital city around the world is quite an honour, particularly for us here at the Royal Albert Hall,” Ainscough continued.
“To find something like Sumo, which isn’t just a sport but is a cultural moment, has a great tradition and ritual attached to it, it makes it even more interesting.
“We’ve had wrestling and boxing here at the Royal Albert Hall for well over 100 years, but Sumo is a completely different level and nature of sport and that’s why it’s such a fascinating thing to bring here.”
Sumo is considered more than just a sport in Japan. There is a ceremonial-religious aspect which dates back more than 1,500 years, with competitors living almost monastic lives in “heya” stables, where they observe strict and highly restricted lifestyles.
Forty of Japan’s top wrestlers are expected to travel to London to compete across five days from October 15-19.
The winner of the 1991 tournament and now the chairman of Sumo Kyokai, Hakkaku Rijicho, was in London on Wednesday to help launch the event.
“There were many talks before before but with Covid it was not the right moment,” he said.
“We will really bring the authentic way of presenting a Sumo tournament to London. It starts with the wooden clacks that marks the start and end of the tournament. These are very simple things but we would like to keep this authenticity when we present it in London.”
Ainscough added: “It’s what the Royal Albert Hall was built for. It says on the outside of the building, we were built for all nations, and so part of our job is to enable the British public to encounter different cultures and different experiences.”
