Noboru Asahi

In 2001, Asahi retired from Shooto and founded the Tokyo Yellowmans gym.

His streak snapped, however, when he was sent to the 1996 Vale Tudo Japan and fought another Brazilian jiu-jitsu specialist Royler Gracie. Asahi was taken down and held in side control, ending up with Gracie taking his back; he eventually escaped, but the game repeated itself and he got caught in a rear naked choke, being submitted. At the next Shooto event, Asahi lost to Alexandre Franca Nogueira by technical submission due to Nogueira’s famed guillotine choke. Noboru did better in the next VTJ, fighting to a draw with yet another BJJ expert in the form of João Roque, but he fell again to Nogueira in a much longer fight, losing his title.

A former amateur wrestler, Asahi was trained in Satoru Sayama’s Super Tiger Gym, where he learned shoot wrestling, and later moved to Noriaki Kiguchi’s dojo to polish his skills. He made his debut in Shooto in 1992 submitting Tomoyuki Saito. Showing his grappling excellence, Noboru captured the Shooto Featherweight Championship from Kazuhiro Sakamoto and enjoyed a thirteen-fights winning streak, with victories over Yuki Nakai and Masato Suzuki, as well as Brazilian jiu-jitsu grappler Leandro Lima de Azevedo.

Noboru Asahi (朝日 昇 , Asahi Noboru, born January 5, 1968) is a Japanese retired mixed martial artist, a designer, and an owner of MMA gym.

He was born in Yokohama, Kanagawa, Japan on January 5, 1968, as Shin’ichi Asahi (朝日 愼一 , Asahi Shin’ichi) .