JapanUp! magazine

Olympic fairy tales are supposed to end on the medal podium. However, Japan’s beloved “Rikuryu” pair apparently read the script and decided it needed one more chapter. On August 23, figure skaters Riku Miura and Ryuichi Kihara, who won Japan’s first-ever Olympic pairs gold medal in Milan this February, announced their engagement, and the proposal photos stopped Japanese social media cold: Kihara on one knee on the ice, ring in hand, both of them wearing the very costumes from their gold medal free skate. Quick Answer: Riku Miura (24) and Ryuichi Kihara (34), the pair known as “Rikuryu,” announced their…

Two days ago, we framed this final as the oldest paradox in the Japanese language: the all-piercing spear of Chiben Wakayama’s offense against the all-stopping shield of Kendai Takasaki’s defense. However, when the answer finally came on Saturday in Japan, it arrived with a twist worthy of 2,300 years of waiting. Chiben Wakayama won 4-3, seizing its fourth national title in a seesaw masterpiece decided in the eighth inning, and the tournament’s most feared lineup claimed the crown without its tying or winning run ever touching a bat’s sweet spot. The spear pierced the shield, yes. But with its handle.…

Two days ago, we relayed the question consuming Japanese baseball media: can anyone stop Yokohama? However, Koshien never lets a narrative harden into fact. On Thursday, Chiben Wakayama answered in the span of three innings, knocking record-setting ace Shoki Oda out of the game with a four-run third capped by a majestic three-run homer, and rolling to a 7-1 win. Hours later, Kendai Takasaki suffocated Tenri 1-0 to reach its first summer final in school history. Saturday’s championship game is now set, and it is the purest stylistic collision this tournament can produce: the best offense in the field against…

Three weeks ago, 49 teams arrived at Koshien. However, after Tuesday’s quarterfinals, four remain, and the day that decided them contained everything this tournament does best: a 154-pitch shutout, an 18-hit demolition, a record-breaker somehow raising his own bar, and a first-time qualifier from earthquake-hit Kumamoto taking its fairy tale into extra innings before falling by a single run. The semifinals are set for August 20 in Japan: Chiben Wakayama vs Yokohama, and Tenri vs Kendai Takasaki. For LA readers, that translates to prime viewing hours on the afternoon and evening of the 19th, Pacific time. Quick Answer: The Koshien…

Sports records usually fall on quiet afternoons, in blowouts, when nothing is at stake. However, Koshien does not do quiet. When Yokohama’s ace Shoki Oda broke the tournament’s all-time pitch speed record on Friday, he did it in the sixth inning of a 1-1 game, with the bases loaded and nobody out, after his own bench had intentionally walked a hitter to create the jam on purpose. The scoreboard flashed 156 km/h (97 mph), the fastest pitch ever displayed at Koshien Stadium, and 40,000 people made the sound Japanese sportswriters simply call “the doyomeki”: the collective gasp of a stadium…

If you or someone you know is flying to or from Tokyo this week, read this first. Record-breaking rain hammered Chiba Prefecture overnight into August 14 Japan time, triggering the country’s highest-level emergency rain warning and cutting the train and bus links out of Narita Airport, Tokyo’s main international gateway. As of 4:00 AM, about 7,000 passengers were stranded inside the terminals, and the disruption lands in the middle of Obon, Japan’s busiest travel week of the year. Quick Answer: Heavy rain suspended trains and buses serving Narita Airport overnight, leaving roughly 7,000 people in the terminals as of 4:00…