Sumo in Venezuela? Another fight against a severe crisis



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November 8, 2018 08:20 AM
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Updated on November 8, 2018 09:18 AM

Far from the size of Japanese mammoth fighters, athletes such as Walter Rivas breathe in Venezuela. They are looking for a space on the map of the thousand-year-old Japanese sport, but they have a very important rival: the economic crisis.

"Sumo in Venezuela? Yes, it's here in Venezuela," asks Duglexer González himself, who is known as King Musampa, one of the first practitioners of discipline in the Caribbean country, and now the head of the federation established in 2012.

"We are fighting against taboos and high costs," says Musampa, one of those responsible for baseball, football, basketball and boxing, in which baseball, football and boxing predominate.

"We're not just fat," he said frankly.

However, the chosen route is not easy if the basic foods are limited and the prices due to the explosion are expansive expansive.

"I'm in the category of 115 pounds and I'm always underweight, 20 or 15 kg below," says AFP Rivas, a high 1.74 meter and 90 kilograms of solid muscle. Two years ago, the South American champion was decorated.

The only country in which a professional sumo is carried out is Japan, with its monumental yokozunami locked in "dohyo", the circle in which they fight.

Less ritual, an amateur sumo, with a view to becoming an Olympic sport, runs in the categories -85 kg, -115 kg and +115 kg in the male branch and -65 kg, -85 kg and +85 kg per woman

Hyper-Caloric Needs Designate Top-Class Athletes.

Men's top categories, in competitive cycles, need about 10,000 calories a day, Musamp explains.

It needs five to six meals a day, with 250 or 300 grams of protein in each, vegetables and fruits.

The consumption of the women's largest division is between 6,500 and 7,500 calories, Musampa adds, while monitoring the practice at the Brígido Iriarte Stadium in Caracas.

"Whatever exists"

The Venezuelan sumo team supports the National National Institute of Sport (IND) to cover the nutritional needs of its members at a competitive stage; but the situation is complicated when there are no tournaments.

"When the big championship consumes more calories, more protein to make it a little more weighty, but, like the situation (in Venezuela), we have to eat everything that's there," explains Rivas, who earns a living instructor at a gym in the city of Barquisimeto (West).

According to the private worker documentation and analysis center, 11 minimum wages are needed to cover basic food in Venezuela.

Food is not the only problem. Due to scarcity of resources, Venezuela has canceled its participation in the last South American championship last September in Sao Paulo, Brazil, a melee to fight sports in Latin America.

I ran with three men and three women.

"He touched us," he regretted Musampa, referring to the epidemic of ski passes – the default freight car – which affected the Venezuelan sport due to budgetary problems and lack of air tickets during the mass departure of airlines due to sovereign debt.

Venezuelan boxing, volleyball, softball and fencing teams have been crossed by international rivals. This even happened in the cycle to the Tokyo 2020 Olympic Games with Boxer Yoel Finol, a silver medalist in Rio 2016.

"With more competitive friction, we can do great things," AFP AFP said. Eukaris Pereira, one of the suspects, who had to suspend cooperation.

Winning rooms

Sumo performed in Venezuela in 2012, the first national championship in Maracay (center-north).

"We were the first generation of sumotors in Venezuela. We came from other disciplines: fights, judo, samba," recalls Musampa, who then competed with his 130 pounds and signs of identity: the tattoo of former Socialist former President Hugo Chávez, who covers his left hand.

Musampa is already retired, vice president of the new union. "Today we have 36 clubs, associations and athletes of the world class, such as María Cedello", medals in international events, says.

A little bit was joined by an athlete. "My friend has been inviting me for a long time. I was rejected because it was necessary to use mawachi," says Rivas, referring to a typical band that is worn by the summers. He was a fighter.

Sumo, who is trying to gain ground, organized exhibitions in people's fields, as leaders consider this to be a "tool" for social work.

"We have reached places where we did not think that it could be achieved," Musampa said.

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