French Sumo Wrestling Has Very Little to Do with Japanese Sumo Wrestling

The Jean Dame gym, located in Paris's Second Arrondissement, reeks of a singular mixture of feet sweat and armpit effluvia. In the middle of the tatami, two sumo wrestlers bow to each other, getting ready to fight. Legs spread wide, butt up, they're trying to concentrate before the fight starts. The only sound comes from the rain splashing on the windows.

Suddenly, the sumotoris put their hands on the ground and hurl themselves at one another, grunting. Each wrestler tries to grab his opponent, throwing a few slaps to confuse him and force him out of the dohyō—the circular ring where they fight. In Jean Dame, sumotoris are all amateurs, and under the traditional mawashi—a belt wrapped around the waist and crotch—they all wear boxer shorts.

Professional sumotoris weigh about 330 pounds. Here, no one even gets to 200 pounds. These guys don't dream of becoming professional sumo wrestlers either—they work in bookstores or in IT services. Paris Sumo gives the average man a chance to swap his tie for a belt to wrap around his ass.

"Sumo is not attractive to people who want to start practicing a martial art. It can't be useful in real life, because it is only about forcing the opponent out of the ring," explains the club's founder, Antoine Marvier.

Romain performs a bow before a fight.

The simplicity of sumo never prevented Antoine from being fascinated by the sport. In 2009, while chatting to other sumo enthusiasts on sumo forums, he decided to found the club . People around him were both surprised and amused. “You don't look like a sumo. You're too skinny,” people would say. Or: “You'll have to wear a thong that will go right up your butt!”

Sumo isn't particularly well know in France. To follow professional competitions, you have to scrabble online for a streaming site or subscribe to Kombat Sport—the only channel broadcasting sumo tournaments in France. Whereas thousands of people already practice sumo in Eastern Europe, in France there are only a few competitors. Jean Dame is the only place you can practice the sport, which means the sumotoris of the Paris Sumo Club have to be resourceful. Antoine crafted the dohyō and the mawashis himself.

Before getting on the ring, today's fighters—Guillaume, Mathieu and Alain—warm up. They briefly discuss the last book they read and Japanese culture. After performing a few "chikos"—the pre-fight position—they do what they call the “roasted banana” and the “Mexican slug”: They try to move forward while being on their back, without using their arms or legs. “It was hard to find a name for these moves,” says the coach. He invented these exercises, adapting the warm-ups as new members joined the club. He also searched for tutorials on the internet.

Antoine and Romain fighting

The dozen members also know they will probably never get into a Japanese arena. “We are light-years away from what is done in Japan,” says Bastien, the member who is the Japan expert among the group. All of try to follow the tournaments, but Bastien took it a step further: He's so far written two essays on the topic, one of which is on the “Globalization of Professional Sumo Wrestling.” His knowledge helped him become a consultant for Eurosport—a job he kept for five years, until the channel stopped broadcasting tournaments in 2007.

He's already been to Japan six times, where he was impressed by how the wrestlers trained. “When you get there, it feels like Sparta! They train for hours, covered in sand. It looks very tough.”

Bastien, wrestling with Guillaume

The Parisian sumotoris are no Spartans, but they don't neglect the warm-up either. Like with any other sport, if you are not careful you can easily be injured. “We have members who broke a rib during a warm up,” warns Antoine.

To him, sumo is the full-contact wrestling sport par excellence. “You're have to get close to your opponent, and you have to grab him and force him out of the ring.” There are no weight classes, which means a wrestler could face someone twice his weight. The fights are quick; they usually last less than 20 seconds.

Romain and Antoine warming up

Next to the dohyō, Romain catches his breath after a fight. Like Bastien, he's visited Tokyo too: He went to Ryogoku—the heartland of professional sumo, where the wrestlers train. He liked how sumo mixed sports and tradition.

“When I got back and heard of the Paris Sumo Club, I just couldn't believe it. I wanted to try, but I was scared that they would laugh at me because of my weight.” He's now been coming every Sunday for three years.

In Paris, the ceremonial is shortened too: They don't throw salt on the ring before fights, and they perform shorter bows. “If we wanted to follow the tradition strictly, it would take too much time,” says Alain, a 50-something with Real Madrid's Marcelo's haircut.

That's why the French sumotoris take liberties. Romain even brought his wife once—women's access to the dohyō is forbidden in Japan. “She's got the fighting spirit, so she liked it. But it's true that it's very rare to see a woman here.”

A few new members join every year out of curiosity, but the main goal for Antoine and the others is to make sure the club will go on. Once, while in Lyon promoting the club, they approached Jacques Chirac and tried to get him to join. But he never showed up.

Antoine Marvier believes there is only one thing that could help sumo develop quickly in France: “It needs to become an Olympic sport. A lot of people would try it if it did.”