1956 Summer Olympics / Participant (Japan)

JPN

4th	10	5

Japan took part in the 1956 Summer Olympics in Melbourne with a delegation of 110 athletes (94 men and 16 women) in 71 competitions in 13 sports. The nation was most successful in gymnastics competitions, Takashi Ono alone won five medals. Gold and silver were also won in swimming and wrestling. The standard bearer at the opening ceremony was the wrestler Shōzō Sasahara .

Five months earlier, Japan took part in the Olympic Equestrian Games in Stockholm with two riders, they could not win a medal.

Participants by sport

basketball

Men

• 10th place

• Riichi Arai
• Manabu Fujita
• Kenichi Imaizumi
• Takashi Itoyama
• Hitoshi Konno
• Setsuo Nara
• Tetsuro Noborisaka
• Reizo Ohira
• Hiroshi Saitō
• Shutaro Shoji
• Takeo Sugiyama

Boxing

Men

• Toshihito Ishimaru
• Shinichiro Suzuki
• Kenji Yonekura

fencing

Men

• Masayuki Sano

Soccer

Men

• Round of 16

• Yoshio Furukawa
• Ryūzō Hiraki
• Isao Iwabuchi
• Tadao Kobayashi
• Waichirō Ōmura
• Michihiro Ozawa
• Hiroaki Satō
• Yasuo Takamori
• Masanori Tokita
• Masao Uchino
• Shigeo Yaegashi
• Yukio Shimomura
• Isamu Kinoshita
• Takashi Takabayashi
• Kakuichi Mimura
• Taizo Kawamoto
• Ken Naganuma
• Akira Kitaguchi

Weightlifting

Men

• Yukio Furuyama
• Yoshio Nanbu
• Kenji Ōnuma
• Hiroyoshi Shiratori
• Takahiro Yamaguchi

athletics

Men Kanji Akagi Hideo Hamamura Kurao Hiroshima Yukio Ishikawa Fumio Kamamoto Yoshiaki Kawashima Akira Kiyofuji Teruji Kogake Yoshio Kojima Yoshitaka Muroya Keiji Ogushi Kōji Sakurai Hiroshi Shibata Yoshiro Sonoda Shigeharu Suzuki Masaji Tajima Kyohei Ushio

Women Ko Nakamura Yoriko Shida Yoshie Takahashi

Cycling

Men

• Tetsuo Osawa

horse riding

• Koichi Kawaguchi
• Kunihiro Ohta

Wrestling

Men

• Tadashi Asai
• Minoru Iizuka
• Mitsuo Ikeda

  Gold welterweight freestyle

• Shigeru Kasahara

  Silver lightweight freestyle

• Kazuo Katsuramoto
• Saburo Nakao
• Mitsuhiro Ohira
• Shōzō Sasahara

  Gold featherweight freestyle

rowing

Men

• Toshiji Eda
• Masao Hara
• Yoshiki Hiki
• Takashi Imamura
• Yozo Iwasaki
• Junichi Kato
• Sadahiro Sunaga
• Yasuhiko Takeda
• Yasukuni Watanabe

shoot

• Choji Hosaka
• Yukio Inokuma
• Tokusaburo Iwata
• Ujitoshi Konomi
• Tomokazu Maruyama
• Yoshihide Ueda

swim

Men Yukiyoshi Aoki Masaru Furukawa Gold 200 m chest Keiji bunny Takashi Ishimoto Silver 200 m butterfly Manabu Koga Hideo Ninomiya Yoshiro Noda Koji Nonoshita Hiroshi Suzuki Atsushi Tani Kazuo Tomita Seizaburo Yagi Tsuyoshi Yamanaka Silver 400 m freestyle Silver 1500 m freestyle Masahiro Yoshimura Silver 200 m chest

Women Hitomi Jinno Yukiko Otaka Yoshiko Sato Setsuko Shimada Eiko Wada

do gymnastics

Men Nobuyuki Aihara Silver team all-around competition Silver bottom Akira Kono Silver team all-around competition Masami Kubota Silver team all-around competition Silver bars Bronze rings Takashi Ono Silver individual all-around Silver team all-around competition Bronze ingot Gold horizontal bar Silver pommel horse Masao Takemoto Silver team all-around competition Bronze ingot Bronze rings Bronze horizontal bar Shinsaku Tsukawaki Silver team all-around competition

Women Mitsuka Ikeda Kyoko Kubota Shizuko Sakashita Suzuko Seki Kazuko Sogabe Keiko Tanaka-Ikeda

Diving

Men Yutaka Baba Ryo Mabuchi

Women Hatsuko Hirose-Kawai Kanoko Tsutani

Web links

• Japanese Olympic team from 1956 in the Sports-Reference database (English; archived from the original )
• Japanese Olympic team from 1956 in the Sports-Reference database (English; archived from the original )