Playback ’93] Ten months after the “engagement of the century” with Rie Miyazawa was called off, Takanohana’s “new love” was discovered and photographed!

What did “FRIDAY” report 10, 20, and 30 years ago? In “Playback Friday,” we take a look back at the topics that made headlines back then. This time, we will look back at the article from the November 19, 1993 issue, which was published 30 years ago, “‘Riego’ for the first time! Ozeki Takanohana finds a new lover. The engagement of Takanohana (then 20, Takanada) and Rie Miyazawa (then 19), which was announced in October 1992, was called the “speedy engagement of the century” and surprised the entire nation. However, it was called off only three months later, causing even more of a stir. About 10 months later, he became an ozeki. He had become an ozeki and changed his name to Takanohana, but had found a new love…

Playback! On the night he finished his tour… The new ozeki took time out of his busy schedule to have a series of encounters.

It was early October. A few days before he left for a two-week tour in the Kansai region after the September tournament, Takanohana appeared at a white apartment in Meguro, Tokyo, around noon. He opened the door to his room, looked to his left and right, bent over and got out, and sank into the passenger seat of the dark blue BMW waiting for him downstairs. In the driver’s seat is a slender woman with long hair who had left the same room a few minutes earlier and turned the car around in front of the entrance. The car drove away as soon as he got in. Then, a few dozen minutes later, she returned to the room again, alone.

At this time, he had a relatively large amount of free time on his hands, and he came by the apartment on other days.

‘I saw him frequently,’ she said. She would pick him up at night and stay at her place, and he would go home the next day.

That night after his tour in the Kansai area ended, Takanohana returned to Tokyo and enjoyed karaoke with this woman in Roppongi before going to her room. The next evening, she drove him back to his room as usual, but in fact, Takanohana had to attend a press conference in Fukuoka in the morning of the following day. He had to attend a press conference in Fukuoka the next morning.

The woman Takanohana was so crazy about, 24-year-old Ako, was a mother of one child who had just divorced in September. When we interviewed her about her relationship with Takanohana, she had the following to say.

In late August, I met her for the first time through a friend, had dinner with her, and went to karaoke. After that, we started talking on the phone. I myself was struggling with divorce issues, and he was my sounding board.”

Meanwhile, Takanohana made the following comment.

He is my best friend at the moment. I don’t have much free time because of tournaments, but when I have time, I want to go see him. But I am not thinking of marriage.

Perhaps the time he spent with Ako was a comforting time for him.

Takanohana changed his name to Takanohana in 1994 and finally became yokozuna in November of the same year. By the time he retired in 2003, he had amassed 429 victories (yokozuna record), making him a grand yokozuna who will go down in history. However, the brainwashing scandal, disagreements with his mother and brother, and other troubles that had plagued him during his active career continued even after his retirement. He was involved in an assault of an apprentice, the resignation of the Sumo Association and the disappearance of his stable, and a divorce from his wife Keiko ……. In August of this year, he remarried his “first love,” whom he had dated in his teens, which was the first bright news in a long time. Recently, however, there have been reports of trouble between her former agency and the agency represented by the son of her remarried partner.

The scoop at the time was a precious picture of Takanohana’s life, which has been full of ups and downs, and a “frame of his youth.