A Rena Retrospective, Part II

Moving to Tokyo

In 2014, Rena won her 4th tournament and clearly established herself as one of the greatest Shoot Boxers ever. Despite this success, she felt stagnant and didn’t seem to be as motivated as she once was. In response to these feelings, she went on trip in February of 2015. Having never really traveled alone before, let alone out of the country, she went all the way to Australia, where she could train with her friend and former opponent, Christina Jurjevic. In a blogpost, Rena explained that she went on the trip, “to broaden my horizons, enjoy martial arts more, increase my motivation, increase my knowledge, and grow as a person.” Interestingly, it was during this trip that she trained in Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu for the first time, a preview of what was to come.

Normally, a fighter taking a vacation wouldn’t be noteworthy, but this trip played an important role in Rena’s decision to leave her gym of roughly 12 years and move to Tokyo. During her trip, she realized that she wanted to see and do more and that by moving to Tokyo, she would have more opportunities. Later, she would add that at the time she felt pretty beat up physically. As a result, she didn’t know how much longer she could keep fighting, but she wanted the last phase of her career to be spectacular. Moving to Tokyo served to motivate her so she could make that a reality. However, unbeknownst to her, this move to Tokyo would have unforeseen consequences leading her career down a path she couldn’t have possibly imagined.

Changing course

Even though Rena moved to Tokyo with the purpose of giving Shoot Boxing one last shot before retiring, other people had a different idea. Notably, both Caesar Takeshi and Nobuyuki Sakakibara wanted her to take part in Rizin, a new MMA promotion that the former Pride CEO was launching that December. Initially, she rejected the idea, like she had repeatedly in the past. However, as a Shoot Boxer she had run out of opponents and kind of lost sight of her goal, so they were able to convince her to do some MMA practice for the time being. Shortly after, she was invited to a press conference where she then realized that she had been scheduled for a fight. So in a way, she trained for her MMA debut without thinking that she would ever actually do it.

Bringing women to New Year’s Eve

It isn’t a secret that New Year’s Eve is an important night for combat sports in Japan. New Years is their biggest holiday and most people spend the night before watching special TV programs, which included combat sports in the early 2000’s. However, when Pride was rocked by scandal, popularity plummeted and MMA was removed from the lineup. Promotions still held events that night, but they were not able to attract the attention of national broadcasters until Sakakibara returned in 2015. It was at this event that Rena made her pro-debut in a fight that was aired live on national television, something that had never happened on New Year’s Eve before. While other women had fought on past New Year’s Eve shows, those matches were never nationally televised and they were usually not met with enthusiasm by the crowd. She didn’t disappoint either, landing a flying armbar that she had learned from Rumina Sato.

In describing the significance of her MMA debut, long-time MMA writer Yukio Fujimura explained, “I’ve been watching women’s martial arts for many years and in the past, when a women’s match started, people would get up to buy drinks or go to the bathroom. There was atmosphere of ‘this is boring because they’re women.’ But this [match] was different, I could see that the crowd was looking forward to it, as one of the highlights of the night and Rena….brought the audience to their feet.”

Unexpected success in a new sport

After winning her MMA debut at the end of 2015, Rena had an extremely busy and fruitful 2016. She fought five times, three times under Shoot Boxing rules and twice under MMA’s. She won all five fights, getting a finish in one of her Shoot Boxing matches and in both of her MMA bouts. Outside of just winning, Rena was getting attention and quickly became one of the more popular fighters in Rizin. Her fight with Miyuu Yamamoto, the sister of Kid Yamamoto and a world wrestling champion, was heavily covered by the media and her New Year’s Eve bout with Hana Tyson was the most watched fight of the event, getting a 10.9% rating on an event that averaged 6.4%. People and news outlets were already declaring that Rena had sparked a women’s martial arts boom and interest in the women was increasing at a rapid rate. The general sentiment at the time is best summarized by Rizin’s Takada who commented, “At the end of last year [2015], there were two women’s matches, but this year there were five. It’s Rena’s hard work that made this possible.”

Aside from the attention she was bring the sport, Rena also found new motivation for herself. In an interview with her former opponent Ai Takahashi, she confessed that if the Caesar hadn’t made the suggestion to fight in Rizin, she probably would have retired that September. Fighting for Rizin motivated her to continue primarily for two reasons, it allowed her to realize a dream, that is fighting on nationalized television, and it presented a new challenge, something that has repeatedly motivated her throughout her career.

The Super-Atomweight Tournament

Near the end of 2016, Rena let it be known that she hoped Rizin would one day put on a women’s tournament. As it turns out, she didn’t have to wait long. After fighting in the spring and summer of 2017, she attended a press conference with Caesar, Sakakibara, and Takada to announce an upcoming women’s tournament that would begin that October and resolve on New Year’s Eve. At the press conference, Rena and her opponent, Andy Nguyen, were the only participants announced, with the winner of Kanna Asakura versus Saori Ishioka and some foreign fighters expected to participate.

In the opening round, Rena fought in the main event and defeated her opponent with an absolutely brutal liver punch. Not only was this the first time a woman fought in a main event for Rizin, it was also on a card that featured the popular Tenshin Nasukawa. The fact that she headlined above him, shows to some degree how popular she had become in her short time with the promotion.

That New Year’s Eve, Rena made it to the finals of the tournament, defeating her opponent in the semi-finals via KO. However, unfortunately for her, Kanna Asakura also made it to the finals and was able to use her wrestling to get Rena down and choke her unconscious near the end of the first round. Even in losing such an important fight there was still a silver-lining. On a card that featured both Kyoji Horiguchi and Tenshin Nasukawa also fighting in tournaments, Rena once again drew the highest ratings, her second New Year’s Eve in a row, with a score of 10.3%. The average for the event was 6.4%.

In many ways, this tournament provides the best evidence of Rena’s impact on the sport. On a macro-level, it isn’t unrealistic to think that without her success in 2016 the tournament wouldn’t have happened. She was the one who first mentioned wanting to do a tournament, she was the first participant announced, headlined the event where the quarterfinals took place, and drew ratings and attention that Rizin needed. Through her popularity, she was able to set the stage for other women to compete, proving Megumi Fujii correct when she said, “People say that the women’s division is too thin to hold a big event, but I think it’s the opposite. If there is stage, athletes will set their sights on it and emerge.” One of the athletes that emerged was Kanna Asakura, now one of the most popular fighters in Japan.

Speaking of Kanna Asakura, she provides an example of Rena’s micro-level impact on the sport. Roughly four years before their fight, Rena was the first fighter Kanna ever saw fight live. Afterwards, Rena brought in her as a sparring partner and during this time, Rena took care of her, buying her dinners, getting her presents, and even gave her the workout shoes that she wore as she trained for their fight. In other words, Rena served as a source of motivation and support for a young fighter looking to get established. On a side note, this seems to be something that Rena has done throughout her career, whether it is in Shoot Boxing with her former teammate Mio or in MMA with her current training partners, like Saori Oshima, who just defeated Kanna in her Rizin debut.

The exhaustion of fighting and a new mindset

Similar to her reaction when she was embarrassed by Erika Kamimura in their exhibition match seven years prior, Rena quickly got a rematch with Kanna. However, despite showing improvement, she lost again, this time via decision. Immediately afterwards, at her post-fight press conference, she commented, “I really want to take a break, it’s been a very intense month, and I want to re-evaluate things. From there, I’d like to decide whether there will be a second chapter or not.” That same month, she went to Hawaii to relax and think. It turns out that going into the finals of the tournament, she had been exhausted, not physically, but mentally. She had felt a burden of carrying the future of women’s martial arts and the burden kept getting bigger and bigger.

During her time in Hawaii, she decided that she wasn’t finished. Not only did she want to get stronger, she also relieved herself of her burden, telling the media upon her return that “From now on, I’m only thinking about myself! Up until now, I’ve been pushing myself to make things happen (in women’s martial arts) but from now on I want to fight for myself. I’m going to be selfish for the rest of my martial arts career.” She also talked about her future. Primarily that while she wasn’t retiring, the end was near and that she had goals of fighting abroad and against foreign talent. This was highlighted by an answer she gave in response to a question about fighting Kanna again, “I think I’m good…I’m tired of fighting Japanese fighters, I want to expand my horizons.”

Fighting at the Garden and getting revenge

Rena’s dream of fighting in the U.S. came true shortly after, when she became the first Japanese woman to fight at the Madison Square Garden at Bellator 222. Both she and Horiguchi fought on the card as part of Rizin’s working agreement with the promotion. However, Rena was choked unconscious in the first round, bringing comparisons to her first fight with Kanna. Also reminiscent of her fight with Kanna, was Rena’s determination to get a quick rematch. That New Year’s Eve, she fought Lindsey again and defeated her, forcing her corner to thrown in the towel in the third round. Interestingly, Lindsey would then join Invicta and fight their now champion, Alesha Zappitella, losing via split-decision.

Today and the future

This weekend, Rena will return to the ring after more than year since her last fight. While there was some speculation that she had been slated for the Tokyo Dome show earlier this year, the pandemic has made it difficult for her to find opponents. Going into this fight, Rena mentioned that she is training harder than ever and it looks like that might be true. While she is still training at Caesar’s and AACC, she has also started training at Brave under the tutelage of the former Olympian Kazayuki Miyata. She actually made contact with him through Hideo Tokoro, who she saw eating with him via social media. This wasn’t a move made specifically for her upcoming fight with Miyuu but rather a desire to fix some holes in her overall game, notable her wrestling.

In regards to her future, even though Rena announced in 2020 that she was going to retire soon after a couple more fights, her feelings look to have changed. When asked about, she playfully explained, “I’m getting a little greedy. I want to retire in front of a full house and when I’m satisfied. I’m having a lot of fun in my new training, so I’ve been rethinking my decision to retire. I don’t know when I’m going to retire, but I’d like to keep going up and up in the final chapter of my career. I don’t think I can fight 30 more fights, so it will be a countdown, but I’m not thinking about it too much… I would like to take up the challenge of fighting in Bellator one more time, I want to fight in America and in order to do so, I need to improve my skills even more…”

You can read Part I here.

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