TOKYO (AP) — Sumo is more than a sport in Japan. It’s a sacred tradition, a 1,500-year-old spectacle steeped in Shinto ritual and ceremony. But at its heart lies a long-standing taboo: women are still ...

Don’t miss the full story, whose reporting from Reeno Hashimoto and Koji Ueda at The Associated Press is the basis of this AI-assisted article. While professional sumo wrestling in Japan maintains its ...

THE TWO young contenders grab at each other’s loincloths. A referee keeps up the shout of “nokotta nokotta”, indicating that the wrestlers are still in the game. Suddenly one lunges forward, sending ...

Sweat darkened the white "dohyo" ring mat as Ireland's first female sumo wrestler shoved and strained, learning a freshly-discovered sport. Having tried the centuries-old Japanese discipline out of ...

From small club shows and Toughwoman tournaments to sold-out arenas and streaming-era super fights, women’s boxing has gone from novelty to global draw. Along the way, a handful of fighters didn’t ...