Everything You Need To Know About Shohei Ono

Shohei Ono was born on the 3rd February 1992 in Yamaguchi city and is considered to be one of the most decorated modern judokas. Ono is best known for finishing his matches by ippon, rather than relying on golden score or points. This can be seen in the number of matches he finishes within seconds, using his famous uchi mata. Ono is a 5th dan black belt and fights in the under 73kg weight category. He is 173cm tall and has a fairly stocky build as you would expect for a world class judoka.

Ono currently lives in Tenri which is fairly close to the city of Osaka in Japan.

Shohei Ono began training judo at the age of 7 after his brother joined the local dojo which was run by his uncle. When he was old enough for high school, Ono moved away from his parents to Tokyo to train the prestigious judo school of Kodo Gakusha.

When discussing winning his first Olympic gold medal, Ono claimed that the feeling of relief of everything being over was much greater than the feeling of happiness that he felt.

From 2012-2021, Ono has won $59,700 from 11 judo tournaments on the IJF world judo tour, his biggest win being $20,800 in 2019 at the world judo championships.

The Judo Style Of Shohei Ono

Well known for his extremely strong thighs, Ono makes use of this with his world beating uchi mata throw, as well as o soto gari. This can be viewed in the video below where is easily able to throw the 100kg+ Teddy Riner during a randori session. When asked about his training regimen, he claims to practice judo for 12 hours per day, including holidays and would repeat a throw 1000 times per day. To compete against stronger foreign judoka, Ono also has a strict excercise schedule which involves weight lifting so he doesn’t feel weak within his own weight category.

Controversies & Bullying Accusations

The main scandal of Ono’s career came out in 2013. Ono and 11 other high level judo teammates had been slapping and kicking junior members of the team at Tenri University. The university has had a strong reputation for judo since the 1970s, so this was an arrangement similar to setups in the USA where aspiring students are mentored by senior sports figures.

It should be noted that this does not reflect well on Ono since he was stripped of his title of captain, having already been previously warned about slapping students just 5 months before this incident. Strangely enough, Ono and his other teammates were only suspended from the program for 30 days – highlighting their importance of growing future Japanese judokas.

As of today, Shohei Ono still trains at Tenri University under coaches Takamasa Anai and Yoshimi Masaki.

Acheivements

• Olympics – 2016 (gold), 2020 (gold)
• World Championships – 2013 (gold), 2015 (gold), 2019 (gold)
• Asian Games – 2018 (gold)
• Asian Judo Championships – 2012 (silver)
• IJF Grand Prix – 2015 (gold), 2016 (gold)

Who Has Defeated Shohei Ono?

As you can see, not many people have defeated Shohei Ono, especially as he has matured as a judoka. Since 2015 he has only lost one match, the other being a default win awarded against him.

• Igor Wandtke defeated Shohei Ono by waza ari at the 2020 Tokyo Olympics (it should be noted that this was Ono’s first real defeat since 2014)
• Arthur Margelidon was given a win over Shohei Ono by walking on to the mat after Ono pulled out of the Tokyo Grand Slam in 2017
• Akimoto Hiroyuki defeated Shohei Ono by yuko at the Tokyo Grand Slam in 2014
• Lee Young Jun defeated Shohei Ono by ippon at the Chelyabinsk World Championships in 2014
• Khashbaatart Sagaanbaatar defeated Shohei Ono by Waza Ari at the Paris Grand Slam in 2013
• Wang Ki-Chun defeated Shohei Ono by Ippon at the Asian championships in 2012
• Mirali Sharipov defeated Shohei Ono by Waza Ari at the Paris Grand Slam in 2012
• Sainjargal Nyam-Ochir defeated Shohei Ono by Ippon at the Qingdao Grand Prix in 2011
• Nicholas Tritton defeated Shohei Ono by Waza Ari at the Tokyo Grand Slam in 2011

Other

According to numerous Japanese interviews, Ono does not have a wife and has publicly stated that he will not consider getting married whilst he is still an active judoka.

In 2018 Shohei Ono visited Mongolia and trained Mongolian wrestling at a local academy. In the video below, he is shown performing his signature uchi mata with a traditional double sleeve grip. It should be noted that this is not Inner Mongolian bokh traditional wrestling as seen by the long sleeves used on the jacket.

Ono is also well known for always using the sauna after every training session, claiming it helps his body a lot with recovery. He has stated that when he retires he would like to create a special sauna facility in Japan.

After the Rio 2016 Olympics, Ono states that he struggled to find motivation and said something along the lines of (translation from Japanese)“I really hated judo, which I started to like, after Rio. What are you practicing for?, I wondered who I was”. Ono was summarising that he had a lot of pressure on his shoulders and people expected him to never lose again.