Saori Yoshida

Saori Yoshida

Saori Yoshida with her coach Kazuhito Sakae after winning the 2008 Olympic gold
Personal information
Born	(1982-10-05) October 5, 1982 Tsu, Mie, Japan
Alma mater	Shigakkan University[1]
Height	1.56 m (5 ft 1 in)
Weight	53–55 kg
Sport
Sport	Freestyle wrestling
Club	High School Wrestling Club Hisai Sogho Security Services[2] ALSOK, Tokyo[1]
Coached by	Masanori Ohashi, Shigeo Kinase,[1] Kazuhito Sakae, Eikatsu Yoshida[3]
Medal record Competitor for  Japan Summer Olympics Gold 2004 Athens 55 kg Gold 2008 Beijing 55 kg Gold 2012 London 55 kg World Championships Gold 2002 Chalkida 55 kg Gold 2003 New York 55 kg Gold 2005 Budapest 55 kg Gold 2006 Guangzhou 55 kg Gold 2007 Baku 55 kg Gold 2008 Tokyo 55 kg Gold 2009 Herning 55 kg Gold 2010 Moscow 55 kg Gold 2011 Istanbul 55 kg Gold 2012 Canada 55 kg Gold 2013 Budapest 55 kg Gold 2014 Tashkent 53 kg Asian Games Gold 2002 Busan 55 kg Gold 2006 Doha 55 kg Gold 2010 Guangzhou 55 kg Gold 2014 Incheon 55 kg

Saori Yoshida (吉田 沙保里, Yoshida Saori, born October 5, 1982) is a Japanese wrestler. Starting in 1998 she won every major competition,^[4] including three Olympic Games, four Asian Games, and 12 world championships, and became the most decorated athlete in the freestyle wrestling history.^[5] As of 2014, Yoshida had only two senior career losses, to Marcie Van Dusen (0–2) on January 20, 2008 at the Team World Cup series, and to Valeria Zholobova (1–2) on May 27, 2012 at the World Cup.^[6]

Yoshida was the flagbearer for Japan at the 2006 Asian Games^[1] and at the 2012 Olympics.^[7] In 2007 she became the first female wrestler to be named Japanese Athlete of the Year, and in 2012 she received the People's Honour Award.^[1]

Weight

Yoshida started competing internationally as a cadet, in 1998, in the 52 kg category. By 2002, when she moved to seniors, she competed in the 59 kg division. The same year, she lost 4 kg, and remained in the 55 kg category until 2014. She moved to the 53 kg class at the 2014 World Cup and World Championships as part of her preparation for the 2016 Olympics,^[8] where the traditional 48–55–63–75 kg scheme will be changed to 48–53–58–63–69–75 kg.^[9] However, two weeks after the World Championships she returned to the 55 kg category at the 2014 Asian Games, which kept the old weight divisions.^[4]

Family and public life

Yoshida is the daughter of Eikatsu Yoshida, a former national champion and wrestling coach.^[10][1] She started training in wrestling aged 3, following her father and two elder brothers.^[11] Since 2011 she is a face of the ALSOK security group and regularly appears in their commercials.^[12]

In December 2008, the wrestling singlet which Yoshida wore in the Olympic final bout earlier that year, was sold for 551,000 yen (ca. US$6,123) at an internet auction, and the money was donated to the Japanese Red Cross society.^[3]

In 2013, when the International Olympic Committee named wrestling as a candidate for exclusion from the Games, she became an active part of the Japanese lobbying team that persuaded the IOC to retain wrestling at the 2020 Tokyo Olympics.^[5]

In May 2014 Yoshida made a cameo appearance in the Japanese television drama Tokyo Metropolitan Guard Center, and later wished to resume acting after retiring from wrestling.^[1]

Championships and accomplishments

• Tokyo Sports
  • Special Award (2014)^[13]

References

External links

Wikimedia Commons has media related to Saori Yoshida.

• Athlete Biography at beijing2008

Olympic Games
Preceded by Ai Fukuhara	Flagbearer for  Japan London 2012	Succeeded by Incumbent