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Kakutogi Road Presents: Sayama's Corner "The Story of Shooto Vol.5"
Previous Page Translated
What he thought of during his baptism as a pro, the submissions hell:
Ordinarily, when being hooked, left and right, in the submissions hell that is a wrestler’s baptism as a professional, the faculty of thinking stops and one no longer has the time to think. But the case of Sayama was different.
The more he got repeatedly hooked and locked during the submissions hell, the more he realized instinctively that “striking techniques are necessary and indispensable for combat sports.” If he hadn’t realized this, Sayama would have never been able to form shooting.
Sayama was a child of the martial arts [combat sports] and may have been its genius. For to realize the necessity of strikes would mean a rejection of submissions as something absolute.
“When one faces an opponent in a real fight, one cannot immediately go into a submission hold. Before that there would have to be punching and kicking.”
Sayama’s idea arose from assuming a real fighting situation. At this point Sayama had already gone beyond prowrestling. Or rather, it may be more accurate to say that he had begun treading a different path than that of prowrestling.
Shooting itself is a combat sport that assumes real fighting. Indeed Sayama was born not to become a prowrestler but born to create shooting.
Once it became clear to Sayama that the techniques of joint submissions are the techniques he needs master, and soon after he had started training [at New Japan], he started going to the Mejiro Gym for kickboxing training, in secret from his seniors and co-wrestlers.
The purpose was to learn techniques from professionals in striking. But the kickboxing training didn’t go as he wanted it to go. The prowrestling tours would run nationwide circuits and when returning to Tokyo, wrestling practice was required.
It was a good week if he could go to Mejiro Gym twice during the week. Nevertheless it was significant that he could meet the kickboxers Toshio Fujiwara and Mitsuo Shima.
Sayama learned the essence of striking techniques from these two. Later he made full use of what he learned here in shooting. As a prowrestler, Sayama was the first to become interested in punching and kicking.
Entering the “Martial Arts Wars” as a representative of Japan:
His association with kickboxing clearly deviated from the world of prowrestlers. By that point Sayama was already deviating from prowrestling.
On November 15th 1977, through his connection with kickboxing, Sayama was to fight against an American full-contact karate [American kickboxing] fighter at the Nippon Budokan.
Calling this event the “Martial Arts Wars,” a team competition was planned between [Japanese] kickboxing and American full-contact karate, but there were no heavy weight fighters among the Japanese. And so Sayama was singled out [as the heavy weight].
Sayama specially trained for this event at Mejiro Gym for three months. He was encouraged by the fact that he could train in kickboxing to the fullest extent. The training was tremendous.
On the day before the match Sayama wrote in his diary, “This will be the striking match that I had longed for. I’ve gained some confidence, so all I need to do is to just go for it!”
He lowered his weight that was 92kg down to 77.5kg to enter the match, but the result was an easy loss to Mark Costello. He was knocked down seven times. The only salvation was that he did not lose by knock out, but otherwise he had nothing but regret.
For Sayama, this experience in every sense was a learning experience. Although the result was a loss, what he had grasped from this experience was incredibly huge.
“Man comes to know the truth only through defeat.” Sayama would probably have said so if he had opened his mouth. But Sayama has avoided any official comment about this match. Sayama had begun reflecting on this match alone without relying on anyone else.
Broadly divided, there were four lessons he had gained from this real fight in striking.
1) Practice is utterly meaningless unless one always keeps in mind real combat.
2) Even if one intellectually understands this, if one lowers the guard even for a moment, one would be effectively hit.
3) The allocation of stamina [endurance] is completely different between striking and grappling.
4) During the match, there were many chances for throwing. If he had just thrown the opponent and then submitted him, he would have won.
Of these four, 3) and 4) were also epoch making discoveries that would fundamentally change Sayama’s life in the martial arts [combat sports].
In other words, what was required was to analyze more distinctly the arrangement of striking techniques and to provide some rational meaning to grappling techniques. Even amongst the same throwing techniques, it makes a big difference in their character whether the throw is to damage the opponent or is to pull him into a joint submission technique.
In order to ease the shock of his defeat, Sayama camped out alone in the Akigawa Valley in the outskirts of Tokyo. Punching the falling autumn leaves while running through the mountain paths in late autumn, he thought about the sliding and impact of kicks while diverting his mood. When he returned to the dojo, he bought for the first time a punching bag.
It was the end of the year with a scattering of light snow and thus the year of 1977 that gave him a nightmare as well as a mighty lesson had come to an end.
Previous Page Partially Translated...
The sudden trip to Mexico:
With the start of 1978, he was met with a different kind of trial. Suddenly talk of a trip to Mexico came up.
He had just bought a punching bag and [p. 16] held his wish to progress in his pursuit of a real combat sport. But for a prowrestler, orders from above were to be obeyed absolutely.
Even the man who lives by his convictions could do nothing about this. He had to put aside his ideal for the time being. The trajectory he had in mind was significantly off.
The Mexican mat world was a world infinitely far from his ideal. The shows were for the entertainment of the poor citizens. The matches were primarily filled with aerial techniques centered on leaping and jumping.
Luch libre (what prowrestling is called in Mexico) that without hesitation does what is the most utterly distinct from his own ideal was the worst situation for Sayama.
Nevertheless Sayama travelled to Mexico in June 1978. He never imagined, even in his dreams, that in only three years he would step on Japanese soil again as Tiger Mask. In fact, no one had imagined this [at the time].
Sayama was clever enough to clearly distinguish his Mexico trip as for the sake of making a living. So in regard to prowrestling itself, he didn't care so much.
For the rest he focused on finding his own time so he could gain more striking skills. In the afternoons when he was free he would visit an acquaintance who manages a karate dojo or go watch boxing matches in order to control himself to direct his consciousness towards striking techniques.
There is an aspect among Mexican citizens that takes as its creed that one should live by taking it easy without working. When a Japanese person enters into this milieu, he takes one of the two paths of either becoming thoroughly lazy or rejecting Mexico.
Sayama took the latter path. Sayama did not want to lose to Mexican society that would shred to pieces any ambition. He bought a punching bag and kicked it as much as he could. As a result he tore it into two.
During the second year of his stay in Mexico, he defeated Ringo Mendoza, the local hero from Indio, to become the NWA world middle weight champion.
This was a great achievement for Satoru Sayama as a prowrestler, but he didn’t feel any deep impression or joy over it. For Sayama was instead earnestly immersed in his study of striking techniques.
Objectively viewed, to become a champion in another country shows that Sayama had the gift of satisfying his audience. Needless to say, significantly, this had to be supported by techniques, but Sayama possessed both talents.
To Be Continued...
Previous Page Translated
What he thought of during his baptism as a pro, the submissions hell:
Ordinarily, when being hooked, left and right, in the submissions hell that is a wrestler’s baptism as a professional, the faculty of thinking stops and one no longer has the time to think. But the case of Sayama was different.
The more he got repeatedly hooked and locked during the submissions hell, the more he realized instinctively that “striking techniques are necessary and indispensable for combat sports.” If he hadn’t realized this, Sayama would have never been able to form shooting.
Sayama was a child of the martial arts [combat sports] and may have been its genius. For to realize the necessity of strikes would mean a rejection of submissions as something absolute.
“When one faces an opponent in a real fight, one cannot immediately go into a submission hold. Before that there would have to be punching and kicking.”
Sayama’s idea arose from assuming a real fighting situation. At this point Sayama had already gone beyond prowrestling. Or rather, it may be more accurate to say that he had begun treading a different path than that of prowrestling.
Shooting itself is a combat sport that assumes real fighting. Indeed Sayama was born not to become a prowrestler but born to create shooting.
Once it became clear to Sayama that the techniques of joint submissions are the techniques he needs master, and soon after he had started training [at New Japan], he started going to the Mejiro Gym for kickboxing training, in secret from his seniors and co-wrestlers.
The purpose was to learn techniques from professionals in striking. But the kickboxing training didn’t go as he wanted it to go. The prowrestling tours would run nationwide circuits and when returning to Tokyo, wrestling practice was required.
It was a good week if he could go to Mejiro Gym twice during the week. Nevertheless it was significant that he could meet the kickboxers Toshio Fujiwara and Mitsuo Shima.
Sayama learned the essence of striking techniques from these two. Later he made full use of what he learned here in shooting. As a prowrestler, Sayama was the first to become interested in punching and kicking.
Entering the “Martial Arts Wars” as a representative of Japan:
His association with kickboxing clearly deviated from the world of prowrestlers. By that point Sayama was already deviating from prowrestling.
On November 15th 1977, through his connection with kickboxing, Sayama was to fight against an American full-contact karate [American kickboxing] fighter at the Nippon Budokan.
Calling this event the “Martial Arts Wars,” a team competition was planned between [Japanese] kickboxing and American full-contact karate, but there were no heavy weight fighters among the Japanese. And so Sayama was singled out [as the heavy weight].
Sayama specially trained for this event at Mejiro Gym for three months. He was encouraged by the fact that he could train in kickboxing to the fullest extent. The training was tremendous.
On the day before the match Sayama wrote in his diary, “This will be the striking match that I had longed for. I’ve gained some confidence, so all I need to do is to just go for it!”
He lowered his weight that was 92kg down to 77.5kg to enter the match, but the result was an easy loss to Mark Costello. He was knocked down seven times. The only salvation was that he did not lose by knock out, but otherwise he had nothing but regret.
For Sayama, this experience in every sense was a learning experience. Although the result was a loss, what he had grasped from this experience was incredibly huge.
“Man comes to know the truth only through defeat.” Sayama would probably have said so if he had opened his mouth. But Sayama has avoided any official comment about this match. Sayama had begun reflecting on this match alone without relying on anyone else.
Broadly divided, there were four lessons he had gained from this real fight in striking.
1) Practice is utterly meaningless unless one always keeps in mind real combat.
2) Even if one intellectually understands this, if one lowers the guard even for a moment, one would be effectively hit.
3) The allocation of stamina [endurance] is completely different between striking and grappling.
4) During the match, there were many chances for throwing. If he had just thrown the opponent and then submitted him, he would have won.
Of these four, 3) and 4) were also epoch making discoveries that would fundamentally change Sayama’s life in the martial arts [combat sports].
In other words, what was required was to analyze more distinctly the arrangement of striking techniques and to provide some rational meaning to grappling techniques. Even amongst the same throwing techniques, it makes a big difference in their character whether the throw is to damage the opponent or is to pull him into a joint submission technique.
In order to ease the shock of his defeat, Sayama camped out alone in the Akigawa Valley in the outskirts of Tokyo. Punching the falling autumn leaves while running through the mountain paths in late autumn, he thought about the sliding and impact of kicks while diverting his mood. When he returned to the dojo, he bought for the first time a punching bag.
It was the end of the year with a scattering of light snow and thus the year of 1977 that gave him a nightmare as well as a mighty lesson had come to an end.
Previous Page Partially Translated...
The sudden trip to Mexico:
With the start of 1978, he was met with a different kind of trial. Suddenly talk of a trip to Mexico came up.
He had just bought a punching bag and [p. 16] held his wish to progress in his pursuit of a real combat sport. But for a prowrestler, orders from above were to be obeyed absolutely.
Even the man who lives by his convictions could do nothing about this. He had to put aside his ideal for the time being. The trajectory he had in mind was significantly off.
The Mexican mat world was a world infinitely far from his ideal. The shows were for the entertainment of the poor citizens. The matches were primarily filled with aerial techniques centered on leaping and jumping.
Luch libre (what prowrestling is called in Mexico) that without hesitation does what is the most utterly distinct from his own ideal was the worst situation for Sayama.
Nevertheless Sayama travelled to Mexico in June 1978. He never imagined, even in his dreams, that in only three years he would step on Japanese soil again as Tiger Mask. In fact, no one had imagined this [at the time].
Sayama was clever enough to clearly distinguish his Mexico trip as for the sake of making a living. So in regard to prowrestling itself, he didn't care so much.
For the rest he focused on finding his own time so he could gain more striking skills. In the afternoons when he was free he would visit an acquaintance who manages a karate dojo or go watch boxing matches in order to control himself to direct his consciousness towards striking techniques.
There is an aspect among Mexican citizens that takes as its creed that one should live by taking it easy without working. When a Japanese person enters into this milieu, he takes one of the two paths of either becoming thoroughly lazy or rejecting Mexico.
Sayama took the latter path. Sayama did not want to lose to Mexican society that would shred to pieces any ambition. He bought a punching bag and kicked it as much as he could. As a result he tore it into two.
During the second year of his stay in Mexico, he defeated Ringo Mendoza, the local hero from Indio, to become the NWA world middle weight champion.
This was a great achievement for Satoru Sayama as a prowrestler, but he didn’t feel any deep impression or joy over it. For Sayama was instead earnestly immersed in his study of striking techniques.
Objectively viewed, to become a champion in another country shows that Sayama had the gift of satisfying his audience. Needless to say, significantly, this had to be supported by techniques, but Sayama possessed both talents.
To Be Continued...
