Japan’s nationals finally go mainstream
The first indication that something big was coming appeared last fall, with the event poster for the 2025 Japanese curling championships.
It was a stone—a very large curling stone—that loomed over the city of Yokohama.
Yokohama is Japan’s second-largest city, housing some 3.8 million people.
The Yokohama BUNTAI, a new arena complex that revitalized a former gymnasium and opened last April, turned out to be the star of the show.
Buntai has three above-ground levels and seats 5,000—a perfect experiment for the Japan Curling Association to take their premier annual event out of a curling club and into mainstream urban consciousness.
The crowds were strong all week, and the imagery of a large-scale curling championship in such a venue is sure to boost confidence in choosing future host arenas.
Just to remind you: Japan loves curling, particularly in Olympic seasons, where the women’s team skipped by Satsuki Fujisawa has won Olympic bronze, followed by silver, over the past seven years.
The fans are mad for it. The players love it, of course, and have been taking steps to harness the madness for a few years now.
Speaking of Yama (the link above), he and his men’s team, skipped by Riku Yanagisawa, won their third title in four years today.
Yanagisawa, Tsuyoshi Yamaguchi, Takeru Yamamoto and Satoshi Koizumi defeated Takumi Maeda of Tokoro 7-5 in the men’s final. They came back from deficits of 4-2 and 5-3 to do it, managing to add a steal in the 10th end to salt the win.
Yanigasawa lost last year’s final to Shinya Abe.
Team second Yamamoto was only 15 when the team captured their first title; he’s now a veteran at only 18 years of age.
The Karuizawa squad had to overcome unfounded accusations in the fall of 2023, of which they were vindicated.
In women’s fours play, the Fujisawa foursome lost the semifinal, which put the victors—the young Momoha Tabata foursome—into the final against Sayaka Yoshimura.
The women’s final saw Yoshimura crack a three-ender in the sixth frame to go up 5-3.
Tabata could only muster a single in the seventh end but stole the eighth to even the match.
The two Sapporo sides then swapped deuces to force an extra end, where Yoshimura used the hammer to score the winning single for an 8-7 victory.
Yoshimura, a two-time national champion skip (2015 and ’21) has been on a roll since her return from taking the 2023-24 season off.
[embed]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NlVx6eHCeOU[/embed]