is a retired Japanese Wrestler. She competed in 10 World Wrestling Championships and won 9 medals, including 5 gold medals.

Biography

Yoshimura aspired to be a professional wrestler when she was at Seijo Gakuen High School because she admired (

Chigusa Nagayo is a Japanese professional wrestler best known for her mainstream popularity in the 1980s as a member of the tag team ''Crush Gals'' with long-time partner Lioness Asuka. She was the founder of the GAEA Women's Professional Wrestling organization ...

and Lioness Asuka). In 1986, She auditioned for

Professional Wrestling Professional wrestling is a form of theater that revolves around staged wrestling matches. The mock combat is performed in a ring similar to the kind used in boxing, and the dramatic aspects of pro wrestling may be performed both in the ring o ...

, but was turned away because she was too short at 153 cm. At that time, she was invited by former world champion

Tomiaki Fukuda is a Japanese sports official and retired freestyle wrestler who won the world bantamweight title in 1965. He is vice president of the Japanese Olympic Committee, where he heads the National Training Center Commission. He is also president of J ...

, which led her to start

Amateur Wrestling Amateur wrestling is a variant of wrestling practiced in collegiate, school, or other amateur level competitions. There are two international wrestling styles performed in the Olympic Games: freestyle and Greco-Roman. Both styles are under the ...

instead of professional wrestling. In 1987, she entered

Seijo University is a private university in Seijo, Setagaya-ku, Tokyo, Japan. It is operated by the Seijo Gakuen institute. Seijo University has its origins in Seijo Gakuen (成城学園), which was founded in 1917 by Dr. Masataro Sawayanagi, a former Ministe ...

. That year, she competed and placed third at the first Women's World Championships in

Oslo Oslo ( , , or ; sma, Oslove) is the capital and most populous city of Norway. It constitutes both a county and a municipality. The municipality of Oslo had a population of in 2022, while the city's greater urban area had a population of ...

Norway Norway, officially the Kingdom of Norway, is a Nordic country in Northern Europe, the mainland territory of which comprises the western and northernmost portion of the Scandinavian Peninsula. The remote Arctic island of Jan Mayen and t ...

, in the 44kg weight class. She won the

1989 World Wrestling Championships The 1989 World Wrestling Championships were held in Martigny, Switzerland ). Swiss law does not designate a ''capital'' as such, but the federal parliament and government are installed in Bern, while other federal institutions, such as the f ...

for the first time, followed by the

1990 World Wrestling Championships The following is the final results of the 1990 World Wrestling Championships. The Men's Freestyle Competition was held in Tokyo, Japan. Men's Greco-Roman Competition was held in Ostia, Rome, Italy and Women's Competition was held in Luleå, Swede ...

. She also won three consecutive World Championships from 1993 to 1995. She then had a period of time away from wrestling due to a knee injury, but continued to wrestle until 2004. In 2009, she was inducted into the UWW (then FILA)

Hall of Fame A hall, wall, or walk of fame is a list of individuals, achievements, or other entities, usually chosen by a group of electors, to mark their excellence or Wiktionary:fame, fame in their field. In some cases, these halls of fame consist of actu ...

and has coached the Japanese women's national team since then. Among others, she has personally coached Yui Susaki since she was 13 years old, who won the gold medal in the 50kg weight class at the Tokyo Olympics.

References

External links

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Shoko Yoshimura Blog

Wintarts Shoko Yoshimura
{{DEFAULTSORT:Yoshimura, Shoko 1968 births Living people Japanese female sport wrestlers World Wrestling Championships medalists Asian Wrestling Championships medalists 20th-century Japanese women