Congrats to Aonishiki, November 2025 Grand Sumo Tournament Winner!
Oh, and congrats on that Ozeki promotion
Wow, that’s been some year for Aonishiki.
Which fish are we looking at here?
Whether it’s the yusho fish or the ozeki fish, congrats to him!
It was such big news, the English-language news picked it up:
Yahoo/BBC News: Ukraine’s Aonishiki becomes sumo champion in Japan
A Ukrainian refugee has become the first person from his country to win an elite-level sumo tournament.
Danylo Yavhusishyn - known by his sumo ring name Aonishiki - arrived in Japan as an 18-year-old in 2022 after the Russian invasion of his country.
Now aged 21, he is the first Ukrainian to claim the prized Emperor’s Cup and the first European in almost eight years to do so.
He is now on the verge of being promoted to the second-highest rank of Ozeki, in what would be the fastest promotion in history.
Aonishiki finished the 15-day tournament in Fukuoka, Japan, with a record of 12 wins and three losses and went on to win the championship play-off against Yokozuna grand champion Hoshoryu, a 26-year-old Mongolian who won last month’s London tournament.
In his winning ceremony interview, Aonishiki was asked if he felt satisfied with his results after three years in sumo.
“No, I think this is just the beginning,” he replied.
Here are the Sumo Kaboom! Ladies interviewing Aonishiki back in September:
Aonishiki’s Unique Position and Trajectory
I mentioned in the pre-tournament post:
You will see that Aonishiki, the new sekiwake, is the shortest of the sanyaku.
Here he is sitting in the entire height-weight scatterplot for November 2025:
I know many of us would love to see him aim for Yokozuna (and I’m sure he will), but his size will make it challenging. That said, let’s check out his weight/rank trajectory:
One year ago, he had just finished the November 2024 tournament in Juryo (at J11) with a 10-5 record. You can see his profile at the Sumo Database here. In January 2025, he was still in Juryo.
And he’s ending 2025 as an Ozeki.
This is just incredible. Ever since entering Juryo, every tournament he had double-digit win records. Even Onosato stumbled a little (not much, to be sure) before making it to Ozeki.
As with Onosato, due to the rapidity of Aonishiki’s rise, I simply don’t have much of a history of tracking Aonishiki’s record. I don’t really measure any ranks below the top of Makushita. I had to dip into the bowels of Wikipedia, SumoDb, and other places to see if I could get better weight info, but I can’t.
Perhaps Aonishiki will put on more weight, as Hoshoryu did, in pursuing the Yokozuna rank. But he still is rather small compared to the other wrestlers at top ranks.
Aonishiki’s Kimarite
I am having a similar difficulty doing any kind of analysis with Aonishiki’s kimarite, though there is more of a record here as SumoDB does keep those bouts going back to his initial entry. But you’ll see a little bit of a problem…
So, when it comes to yorikiri and oshidashi, Aonishiki is quite normal. He is rather balanced between those two, not favoring one or the other.
It’s all the other kimarite for which he’s a bit unusual… and what’s really unusual is trying to analyze what kimarite he loses to.
Because he has only 31 losses so far in his record.
Two kimarite not listed above, to which he had 4 losses each:
tsukidashi (frontal thrust out — losses to: Nagamura (in Sandamne), Kinbozan in Juryo, Daieisho, Yoshinofuji)
tsukiotoshi (thrust down — losses to: three Juryo men - Oshoumi, Tochitaikai, Shishi, and Kotoshoho)
He seems most vulnerable to the types of attacks that would also get Ura — taking advantage of lower center of gravity.
And yeah, a henka might get him if he’s not paying attention. Watch out for those hattakikomi!
