{"id":139730,"date":"2025-08-06T21:23:25","date_gmt":"2025-08-07T01:23:25","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/prowrestling\/?p=139730"},"modified":"2025-08-06T21:23:25","modified_gmt":"2025-08-07T01:23:25","slug":"hiroshi-tanahashis-g1-climax-100-the-names-and-numbers-behind-aces-historic-century","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/prowrestling\/2025\/08\/06\/hiroshi-tanahashis-g1-climax-100-the-names-and-numbers-behind-aces-historic-century\/","title":{"rendered":"Hiroshi Tanahashi’s G1 Climax 100: The Names and Numbers Behind Ace’s Historic Century"},"content":{"rendered":"

There aren’t too many mountains in professional wrestling that have yet to be scaled. But a significant one, ascended over 23 years, was reached earlier this week in the bowels of the Fukuoka International Center. NJPW legend and President Hiroshi Tanahashi became the first wrestler to reach 100 G1 Climax victories,<\/a> having made his tournament debut in 2002. Facing last year’s runner-up, Yota Tsuji, Ace rolled back the years to keep his hopes of a fourth G1 title alive.<\/p>\n

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Photo Credit: New Japan Pro Wrestling<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Much like a particular 17-time world champion,<\/a> Tanahashi is in the midst of his retirement tour. The record eight-time IWGP Heavyweight Champion will contest his final match at Wrestle Kingdom 20 in January 2026.<\/p>\n

But for now, Ace will be reveling in another record. An incredible feat and a testament to the Japanese star’s enduring quality, the list of vanquished wrestlers is a who’s who of top-tier international talent from the last twenty years. But who exactly played their part in Tanahashi’s tournament triumph?<\/p>\n

The first opponent…<\/h2>\n

25-year-old Hiroshi Tanahashi’s first assignment was a tough one. The decorated veteran Shiro Koshinaka, a three-time IWGP Junior Heavyweight Champion, stood between Ace and a first G1 Climax win. <\/span><\/p>\n

The Ace made good on his future star promise, impressing with a debut victory in under nine minutes. But it would be his second match against five-time IWGP world champion (and Koshinaka’s tag team partner) Kensuke Sasaki that would grab the headlines that week. Ace finished off the NJPW all-timer in 100 seconds exactly, a major upset in Hiroshi’s formative years.<\/span><\/p>\n

Hiroshi Tanahashi’s punching bag…<\/h2>\n

When you clock up 100 wins in any tournament, odds are someone took the L more than once or twice over that century. Sadly for 2009 winner Togi Makabe, he is the keeper of that most unwanted statistic: most losses. Makabe has lost nine times to Tanahashi in G1 competition – four more times than the next closest wrestler.<\/p>\n

The following most-defeated wrestlers on the list are recently dethroned IWGP Heavyweight Champion and 2008 winner Hirooki Goto,<\/a> who provided the final Tanahashi victory in last year’s tournament. Joint second is Tanahashi’s former tag team partner Toru Yano, who also contributes five losses to the list.<\/p>\n

It seemed that Togi Makabe was destined to remain connected to Tanahashi’s future successes following their first encounter. Ace’s NJPW debut in 1999 resulted in a loss to Makabe. Togi’s most significant contribution to G1 – a semi-final run in 2007 –\u00a0 ended at the hands of Tanahashi. Ace went on to claim his first G1 title in the final against Yuji Nagata.<\/p>\n

Other wrestlers with several G1 losses to Ace include the aforementioned Yuji Nagata and YOSHI-HASHI (4), Hiroyoshi Tenzan, Manabu Nakanishi, Lance Archer, Tomohiro Ishii, Bad Luck Fale, EVIL, and Zack Sabre Jr. (3).<\/p>\n

Unexpected and international names…<\/h2>\n

While G1 Climax tends to be contested by NJPW wrestlers, as time has gone by, more and more freelancers and international wrestlers have been invited to compete. The move has boosted the tournament’s profile and prestige, and it has also created the opportunity for some dream matches. Unsurprisingly, a number of these encounters make up Ace’s century.<\/p>\n

Contributing two losses to the list is WWE and AEW alum Shelton Benjamin. The three-time WWE Intercontinental Champion suffered losses to Ace in the 2012 and 2014 editions. Shortly before appearing at the inaugural All In in 2018, AEW World Champion ‘Hangman’ Adam Page lost to Tanahashi in his sole G1 tournament to date.<\/p>\n

And win no.59 came courtesy of two-time WWE Champion A.J. Styles. Having lost the IWGP world title to Tanahashi in 2014, Styles failed to get revenge during G1 the following year. Other internationally-known wrestlers on the list include Giant Bernard (aka Prince Albert, A-Train), Doc Gallows, and AEW’s Juice Robinson.<\/p>\n

A slayer of former and future G1 Climax winners…<\/h2>\n

Incredibly, scalps over former and future G1 Climax winners make up just over a third of Tanahashi’s century. Since debuting in 1999, Ace has beaten 11 of the 14 subsequent G1 Climax winners during various editions of the tournament. Among them are three-time winner Hiroyoshi Tenzan and 2019 and 2020 champion Kota Ibushi. Tanahashi also beat three former\/future champions in each of his successful G1 finals – Nagata (2007), Shinsuke Nakamura (2015), and Ibushi (2018).<\/p>\n

The only three G1 champions (1999-present) that Hiroshi Tanahashi hasn’t beaten during the tournament are five-time winner Masahiro Chono, four-time winner Kazuchika Okada, and 2016 winner Kenny Omega.<\/p>\n

The list in full, including every opponent and victory number:<\/h2>\n

 <\/p>\n

\"A
Photo Credit: New Japan Pro Wrestling (@njpwglobal)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

More From LWOS Pro Wrestling<\/strong><\/p>\n

Header photo \u2013 AEW \u2013 Stay tuned to the\u00a0 Last Word on Pro Wrestling<\/a> for more on Hiroshi Tanahashi, NJPW G1 Climax 35 and other stories from around the world of wrestling, as they develop. You can always count on LWOPW to be on top of the major news in the wrestling world, as well as to provide you with analysis, previews, videos, interviews, and editorials on the wrestling world. You can rewatch all NJPW events and plenty more tremendous wrestling content from New Japan Pro-Wrestling on NJPWWorld.com<\/a>, The King of Sports Streaming.<\/span><\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

There aren’t too many mountains in professional wrestling that have yet to be scaled. But a significant one, ascended over 23 years, was reached earlier this week in the bowels of the Fukuoka International Center. NJPW legend and President Hiroshi Tanahashi became the first wrestler to reach 100 G1 Climax victories, having made his tournament […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5450,"featured_media":139796,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_lmt_disableupdate":"no","_lmt_disable":"","sfio_featured_image":false,"sfio_embed_code":"","_ef_editorial_meta_date_first-draft-date":"","_ef_editorial_meta_paragraph_assignment":"","_ef_editorial_meta_checkbox_needs-photo":"","_ef_editorial_meta_number_word-count":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[13,14,2192],"tags":[501,386],"class_list":["post-139730","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-international","category-njpw","category-wrestling","tag-kazuchika-okada","tag-kenny-omega"],"modified_by":"Michael Joseph Sugue, Manager","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/prowrestling\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/139730","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/prowrestling\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/prowrestling\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/prowrestling\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/5450"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/prowrestling\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=139730"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/prowrestling\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/139730\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":139797,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/prowrestling\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/139730\/revisions\/139797"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/prowrestling\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/139796"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/prowrestling\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=139730"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/prowrestling\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=139730"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/prowrestling\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=139730"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}