JAPAN: Fastest hands go for top cup-stacking prize in the 2012 Sport Stacking Championship

Record ID: 466174

  • Title: JAPAN: Fastest hands go for top cup-stacking prize in the 2012 Sport Stacking Championship
  • Date: 26th March 2012
  • Summary: MORE OF HIRASAKI STACKING (SOUNDBITE) (Japanese) 53-YEAR-OLD COMPETITOR SHUUJI HIRASAKI SAYING: "I decided to register as a parent-child team this time. Once I actually tried it, it's really quite interesting and now I'm kind of hooked." SENIOR CITIZEN TEAM STACKING CUPS VARIOUS OF SENIOR CITIZEN TEAM STACKING CUPS PEOPLE CHEERING FOR SENIOR CITIZEN TEAM (SOUNDBITE) (Japanese) 83-YEAR-OLD COMPETITOR SENZABURO KUNIMATSU SAYING: "I don't really have a goal. I'm just doing it to help prevent getting old, I don't really worry about setting a record time."
  • Embargoed: 10th April 2012 13:00
  • Keywords:
  • Location: Japan, Japan
  • Country: Japan
  • Topics: Quirky,Light / Amusing / Unusual / Quirky,Sports
  • Reuters ID: LVA56VFZHDK6WQPE7HFT6VUBWJ44
  • Story Text: Competitors grabbed their cups to get ready, set and stack on Sunday (March 25) in Tokyo, to grab the title of fastest hands in the 2012 Sport Stacking Competition.
    The Japan competition was part of the world-wide Sport Stacking Championships, which sees participants competing to see who can stack cups into a pyramid in the shortest amount of time possible.
    The competitions include individual stacking, where one works with a partner and are only allowed to use one hand, and team relays.
    The winners in each segment are awarded medals, a fact that delighted 8-year-old Shoko Arai.
    "When you get a medal you're of course happy and I like that. So I want to get some sort of medal, but I also do it because you can participate with everyone," Arai said.
    The competition also had a number of parent-child teams, such as 53-year-old Shuuji Hirasaki and his 10-year-old son Ryouya who were practising the one-arm-each stacking style.
    "I decided to register as a parent-child team this time. Once I actually tried it, it's really quite interesting and now I'm kind of hooked," Hirasaki said.
    The participants on Sunday ranged from four years old, to 83-year-old Senzaburo Kunimatsu, who said that he was there to participate with his team mainly for fun.
    "I don't really have a goal. I'm just doing it to help prevent getting old, I don't really worry setting a record time," Kunimatsu said.
    While Kunimatsu's team didn't qualify, it did win a "best-mention" prize, comprising totally of senior citizens.
    The fastest stacker and winner of Sunday's competition qualifies to go on to the World Stacking Championships in Germany in April.
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