Runners are being announced for the torch relay before the 2020 Summer Olympics in Tokyo, and two so far have been big names from the pro wrestling world.
「東京2020オリンピック聖火リレー」の愛知県聖火ランナー42名が決定しました。聖火リレーのルート詳細も併せて発表！
詳細はこちら⇒https://t.co/XJ3TLFIt1I #聖火リレー#TorchRelay pic.twitter.com/KRSY4WYwYS— 東京2020オリンピック聖火リレー愛知県実行委員会 (@run_aichi_jp) December 17, 2019
Kazuchika Okada, New Japan Pro Wrestling‘s current IWGP Heavyweight Champion, is set to bear the Olympic torch for his home prefecture of Aichi. He’s scheduled to take part in the relay (in this uniform) on April 7. (Feel free to give us your best line about making it rain while carrying fire in the comments.) Other torchbearers for Aichi include Olympic figure skater Shoma Uno and retired pro baseball player Norihiro Akahoshi.
東京五輪聖火ランナーに山梨代表で選ばれたぞ！！
光栄です！ pic.twitter.com/HRlzjnJSyA— 武藤 敬司 (@muto_keiji) December 18, 2019
A couple of months later, the relay will include another popular wrestler as it passes through Yamanashi on June 27-28. Keiji Mutoh, aka The Great Muta, will carry the Olympic torch for his home prefecture in June. Mutoh is known for his work in New Japan Pro Wrestling, All Japan Pro Wrestling, the NWA and WCW in the United States, and as the founder of Wrestle-1. At the age of fifty-six, he’s still active in the ring, though not as much as he used to be.
The 2020 Olympic torch relay will start in Greece in March and the Japanese leg will kick off in Fukushima later that month. The torch will be passed through all forty-seven prefectures in Japan, ending up in Tokyo in July ahead of the Olympics opening ceremony on July 24.
