For the sake of his brother who died two days before the match… “Sakama Rakugo,” a high school pro boxer who passed the pro test at first shot, is determined to be a professional boxer.

Naoya Inoue’s brother, who was expected to become the “post-Naoya Inoue,” committed suicide two days before the match.

Kanamu’s timing and timing of his punches are so similar to Kanamu’s that I wondered if they could be so similar.

Ippei’s father, Ippei, 46, squinted at him in the ring after a round of mitts with Sakama Rakuto (16, minimum weight), who passed his professional test on April 10.

Rakuto’s older brother Kanamu, who made his pro debut in May 2009, had risen to 9th in the world rankings with an unblemished record of 9 fights and 9 wins (8 KOs), and had been touted as the “post-Naoya Inoue” of the future.

However, he disappeared on March 16, 2012, two days before his …… match. He jumped off a precipitous cliff on Mt. He committed suicide after suffering repeated injuries and severe weight loss at the young age of 20. Rakugo said, “On the evening of the 17th, I was in Futtsu (Chiba).

On the evening of the 17th, I finally met my brother at the Futtsu Police Station mortuary, and I felt he said to me, ‘Rakugo, I’ll leave the rest to you. But I didn’t immediately know what he had entrusted me with. Did he mean that I should study hard, get into a good university, get a job at a good company, and not worry about my father and mother?　I asked myself these questions for a while.

When the 49th day had passed, Rakugo picked up a pair of boxing gloves that he had left by the altar and bowed to Ippei, asking him to hit him with a boxing mitt.

I’m five years older than my brother, but on my birthday he would always drop me a line to say ‘Happy Birthday’ and buy me a present. He also used to take me to karaoke. ‘Raku, how’s school going? It was just a casual conversation, but he really cared about me.

I wanted to experience with all of my senses the scenery and experiences of my brother, who was such a family man, kind and strong. At that point, I had already decided what I wanted to do, but I knew that my father and mother would worry about me again and that they would oppose me, so I couldn’t immediately say, ‘I want to box.

About a month after she started to hit the mitts, Rakugo made up her mind and told Ippei, “I want to box.

I still vividly remember the look on my father’s face when he asked me if I was serious.

I still vividly remember the look on my father’s face when he asked me if I was serious.

Ippei’s heart was indeed shaken.

Ippei’s heart was indeed shaken. “The gym I belonged to, the Japan Professional Boxing Association, and the Japan Boxing Commission have neither announced nor verified Kanamu’s suicide. I have nothing but distrust for this world. That is why my wife and I were against Rakugo taking up boxing. However, I could tell that Rakugo’s determination was not half-hearted.

Ippei tried to get him to give up by subjecting him to high-intensity training.

Ippei said, “Since I failed at boxing in elementary school, the only exercise I had done was taking hip-hop dancing lessons once a week. I had never done cardiopulmonary training such as stair dashing or rowing an aerobike as hard as I could for 10 sets. It was so hard that I vomited. But my brother had done more rigorous training. I was like, “My brother is awesome! I was fired up to do it.

It was Ippei who raised the white flag.

After Kanamu passed away, my wife and I were both plunged into an abyss, and we spent every day not feeling like living. But working with Raku Kano in this way has given me a positive outlook, and I feel that the hands of the clock, which had stopped, are moving forward little by little.

As the younger brother of a boxer who died an unnatural death, he may be viewed with a certain amount of prejudice. However, he is positive, saying, “I hope I can turn that pressure into energy.

I want to prove that I am as strong as my brother,” he said. I want to prove that my brother is as strong as he is.”

Once again, the bell rang for the fight between father and son.

From the July 11, 2025 issue of FRIDAY