IWGP Heavyweight champion Kazuchika Okada has been given a special honor heading into next year's Olympics in Tokyo.
Okada will be one of the relay runners that will carry the Olympic torch throughout Japan next year. Okada will carry the torch on April 7, 2020 as the torch makes its way through the Aichi Prefecture. The 2020 Summer Olympics will begin on July 24 and end on August 9.
IWGP Heavyweight Champion Kazuchika Okada will be one of the Olympic torch relay runners for the 2020 Tokyo Olympics. He’ll carry the torch on April 7, 2020. (via @run_aichi_jp) pic.twitter.com/k1v44g4Upd
— SI Wrestling (@SI_wrestling) December 17, 2019
It's been an eventful past week for Okada, who also recently won the 2019 Tokyo Sports MVP award. This is the fourth time he won the award and is now joined Keiji Muto and Hiroshi Tanahashi as four-time award winners.
But before Okada runs with the Olympic torch, he will have a couple of big matches taking place in the first week of January at Wrestle Kingdom 14. On the first day of the event, taking place on January 4, he will defend the IWGP Heavyweight title against Kota Ibushi. The winner of that match will face the winner of Jay White vs. Tetsuya Naito for the IWGP Intercontinental title on January 5 and the loser of both matches from January 4 will also face each other on January 5.
