Kagayaki Taishi
Early life and sumo background. Tatsu Ryōya was born in Kanazawa, Ishikawa and is the youngest of three children. His father was a truck driver. Tatsu is a distant relative of former "yokozuna" Wajima Hiroshi. He was a normal-sized baby but grew quickly so that when attending kindergarten he had difficulty fitting into the uniform. He first began practicing sumo whilst in the first grade of elementary school. By the age of thirteen, when he ended his first year at junior high school he stood , and weighed . After competing successfully in junior high school sumo he gave  up formal education at the age of fifteen and entered the Takadagawa stable to pursue a professional career. Career. Early career. In the early part of his sumo career the wrestler subsequently known as Kagayaki competed as "Tatsu", his family name. On entering the professional sport Tatsu revealed that his idol was Hakuhō and that his aim was to become a "yokozuna" "in six or seven years". He was still a month away from his sixteenth birthday when he made his professional debut in May 2010 but recorded six wins in the "jonokuchi" division to earn an immediate promotion. Two  months later another 6-1 result saw him being promoted from "jonidan" to "sandanme", the fourth-highest division. After five more tournaments he was promoted to "makushita" (third division) after a 5–2 result at the Nagoya tournament in July 2011. On his third tournament in the division, in January 2012, the seventeen-year-old Tatsu tied for the lead with six wins at the end of regular competition but was defeated in the first round of an eight-man play-off for the "makushita" championship. Tatsu spent the next two years performing consistently in the mid to upper "makushita" ranks  before a run of eight consecutive winning records ("kachi-koshi") saw him being promoted to "jūryō" (second division) for the November 2014 tournament. It was at this point that Tatsu announced that he had adopted the "shikona" Kagayaki Taishi. The surname comes from the express train service which runs between Tokyo and Kanazawa, his home town, while the given name is a different reading of the characters in Wajima Hiroshi's given name. Kagayaki made an immediate impact in "jūryō", recording 11–4 and 10–5 records in his first two tournaments to reach the brink of another promotion but initially struggled  when moved up to the division's higher ranks. A 10–5 record in September however, put him back in contention and an 8–7 in November 2015 (beating Satoyama on the final day) saw him promoted to "makuuchi" (top division) for the first time. Makuuchi career. Kagayaki struggled in his top division debut: he won only two of his first thirteen matches, one of which was a walk-over when his scheduled opponent, Endō, withdrew with an injury. He won his last two bouts to salvage a 4–11 record but he was relegated back to "jūryō". He recorded only seven wins  in March but secured a second promotion with a 10–5 result in May. He barely avoided relegation with a 7–8 record in July but recorded his first "kachi-koshi" (winning record) in the top division with nine wins in September. Ranked at a new high of "maegashira" 9 he recorded six wins in November and was dropped to "maegashira" 11 for the January 2017 tournament when he posted an 8–7 record. He returned to "maegashira" 9 in March and retained his rank for the May tournament despite a 7–8 result. He continued to maintain his place in the top division  for the rest of that year, reaching a new career-best rank of "maegashira" 4 in July. After reaching as high as "maegashira" 3 for the November 2020 tournament, Kagayaki posted consecutive losing records, eventually being relegated back to "jūryō" for the January 2022 "basho". However he returned to the top division for the March 2022 tournament. Fighting style. Kagayaki is an "oshi" and "tsuki" specialist, which means he relies on pushing and thrusting techniques to defeat his opponents rather than belt-wrestling. His most common winning technique is "oshidashi" (push-out) which accounts for 46% of his wins. Career  record.