championships; in June 1943, at 165 pounds, he was pressing 250, snatching 240, and clean and jerking 310, for a total of 800 pounds. Following his military discharge, Sakata remained in Honolulu, and became de facto leader of a group of local lifters including Richard Tomita. During a tournament held at the Nuuanu YMCA on in November 1946, Sakata set a Hawaiian record in both the snatch and the clean-and-jerk, plus an unofficial world record in the press. The same year he also won the Mr. Hawaii physique title. Henry Koizumi, athletic director of the tournament, suggested that Sakata and his partner Richard Tom organize a weightlifting team. The goal was to place well in the USA Weightlifting National Championships, which were held in Dallas, Texas, on in June 1947. Sakata placed first in the 181-pound class with a total lift of 800 pounds. Tom meanwhile placed first in the 123-pound division with a total lift of 610 pounds. Sakata subsequently qualified for United States' 1948 London Summer Olympic team, lifting a total of 380 kg in the light-heavyweight division and winning a silver medal behind Stanley Stanczyk, whom he later competed against in the US Senior National Championships. Professional wrestling career Early years In 1949, Sakata retired from weightlifting and began training in professional wrestling. His instructors were Tetsuro Higami and Ben Sherman. He initially wrestled as "the Human Tank, Mr. Sakata", drawing on his World War II service and Olympic accolades to play a face, though he later adopted his more well-known heel gimmick of Tosh Togo. Under the Togo gimmick, Sakata wrestled across Hawaii and later toured mainland America and Canada, mostly on the West Coast and in the Pacific Northwest, which had a large Japanese immigrant population he proved popular with. He briefly formed a tag-team with Frank Stojack during a tour of Washington state, and also tagged with Tor Yamato during a Midwestern tour. Japan In July 1951, NWA Hawaii promoter Al Karasick invited Sakata to join a special overseas tour to Japan, sponsored by a Tokyo Shriners chapter as a charity venture for a children's hospital. Sakata and several other wrestlers flew to Tokyo, where they held a series of shows at the Metropolitan Memorial Hall and Ryōgoku Kokugikan. One such show was historically significant for being the professional wrestling debut of Rikidōzan, a Korean-born sumotori who would become one of the most popular