From golden child to big brother, Japanese paddler Harimoto Tomokazu eyes medals in Paris with a certain new team-mate
Move over Abes, Japan's newest Olympic siblings are Tomokazu and Miwa with the elder Harimoto more than fired up about this summer's Games.
Table Tennis
For his second Olympic Games, Harimoto Tomokazu will have a role other than an athlete.
Big brother. And he can’t wait.
“I’ve been longing for us to compete as siblings,” Harimoto told reporters last week, after the Japan Table Tennis Association handed out Paris 2024 quota to three men and women each, including Tomokazu and his younger sister Miwa.
“But I didn’t think it would happen so soon and I’m over the moon. I couldn’t wait for the announcement. I was refreshing my social media every minute.”
Family ties: Harimoto Miwa and Tomokazu, centre, with their parents at the All-Japan Table Tennis Championships last month.
Once the golden child of world table tennis, Tomokazu is now a stocky 20-year-old carrying the sport in Japan on his broad back. He will be 21 when the Games open this summer.
Tomokazu absolutely adores Miwa, who is five years his junior. The feeling is mutual, and Miwa is set to make her Olympic debut in Paris having secured a spot for the team event.
“I just had to hold up my end of the bargain because my brother already had it in the bag,” said Miwa, who got the nod over two-time Olympian Ito Mima for her tantalising upside. “I’m so thrilled to be going to the Olympics together.”
At Tokyo 2020, Tomokazu disappointed as many favoured Japanese athletes did wrapped in the Covid bubble, crashing out in the singles’ round of 16.
But he did help his country to a team bronze and will be counted on to come through this summer in the individual event which the Chinese have perennially owned.
Last month, Tomokazu won the men’s title at the All-Japan Table Tennis Championships - something he had not done since he was 14 when he rewrote the then record by three years.
While Tomokazu looks after Miwa, he is not simply doling out brotherly love. He respects her as a fellow paddler who is ranked 16th in the world behind Hayata Hina and Ito. In the two months from March 2022, Miwa shot up 553 places.
Tearing down the Great Wall of China in Paris will be no easy feat. But maybe the healthiest sibling rivalry of them all just might do the trick for Tomokazu.
“Watching my sister last year and the year before, I felt it was a matter of time before she caught up to me,” he said.
“Now we’re going to compete on the same stage and I think we’ll be rivals in the best meaning of the word. I consider her a team-mate - we can inspire each other."