Tomoaki Honma

Tomoaki Honma (本間 朋晃) is a Japanese professional wrestler currently working for New Japan Pro-Wrestling (NJPW).

In NJPW, he is a former one-time IWGP Tag Team Champion and a two-time World Tag League winner with Togi Makabe.

During his second year of high school, Honma initially had aspirations of joining the New Japan Pro-Wrestling (NJPW) dojo and took part in a tryout, but was unsuccessful and sought training elsewhere.

He eventually trained with Michinoku Pro Wrestling for 1 year, but did not debut in Michinoku Pro and instead spent his early career in Big Japan Pro Wrestling (BJW), debuting for the promotion in May 1997.

After spending time wrestling in opening matches for the promotion, Honma began to compete in BJW's deathmatch division.

While a part of BJW, he became the first wrestler to use a lightube in a match, an item that has since become synonymous with deathmatch wrestling worldwide.

In October 2000, Honma left BJW after disagreements with company management.

After touring with various independent promotions such as IWA Japan, Onita Pro, and Rainbow Pro, Honma debuted in All Japan Pro Wrestling (AJPW) on November 24, 2001, against Nobukazu Hirai.

Honma was invited by owner Motoko Baba to join the promotion, and signed a full-time contract with the company in March 2002.

In February 2003, he formed Turmeric Storm with Kazushi Miyamoto, but the team later disbanded on April 20, 2004, after losing a trial series.

In 2005, Honma became affiliated with Kensuke Sasaki's Kensuke Office agency in an effort to further improve his career.

A severe neck injury kept him out of action throughout much of early 2006, but he returned in March of that same year.

Honma announced his departure from AJPW on April 28, 2006, and became a freelancer.

Throughout 2006, he worked for Pro Wrestling Zero1-Max and King's Road, where he reformed Turmeric Storm with Kazushi Miyamoto.

On September 24, 2006, Tomoaki Honma and Jun Kasai won Apache Pro-Wrestling Army's WEW World Tag Team Championship from Takashi Sasaki and Badboy Hido.

Throughout 2006, Honma appeared in New Japan Pro-Wrestling's (NJPW) Wrestle Land sub-brand as "Makai Masked Canadian", a masked member of the Makai Club faction.

The team vacated the championship on February 20, 2007.

Honma participated in the 2007 New Japan Cup tournament, falling to veteran Takashi Iizuka in his first round match.

Prior to the match, Honma expressed interest in joining Hiroyoshi Tenzan's GBH faction, and was allowed to join after making a positive impression on Tenzan; however, Tenzan became disenchanted with Honma's difficulty in gaining victories, so he forced Honma to pass through a trial series to prove that he belongs in GBH.

After ending his trial series with a losing record, Honma was initially kicked out of GBH but was allowed to remain in the group, after Togi Makabe took over the group's leadership.

In April 2009, Honma showed his loyalty to Makabe by remaining in GBH after the other members of the group left to form the Chaos faction with Shinsuke Nakamura.

On December 23, 2011, Honma received a rare championship opportunity, when he challenged for the IWGP Intercontinental Championship in the main event of a NJPW show at Korakuen Hall, losing to champion Masato Tanaka at the end of a 23 minute bout.

On March 28, 2012, New Japan announced that the promotion had released Honma from his contract due to a "personal problem".

Following his release from NJPW, Honma returned to AJPW on September 8, 2012, where he remained for the rest of the year and much of early 2013.

In March 2013, Honma began appearing in Pro Wrestling Noah, where he took part in the 2013 Global Tag League with Akitoshi Saito.

The duo finished the tournament with one win and two points.

On March 23, 2013, Honma returned to NJPW, saving Togi Makabe from Chaos.

It was later revealed that Honma would be working for NJPW full-time as a freelancer.

The reunited GBH had their first match back together on April 7 at Invasion Attack, where they were defeated by Masato Tanaka and Yujiro Takahashi in a tag team match.

On May 3 at Wrestling Dontaku 2013, Honma unsuccessfully challenged Tanaka for the NEVER Openweight Championship.

Honma received another shot at the title a year later at Wrestling Dontaku 2014, but was again defeated by the defending champion, Tomohiro Ishii.

From July 21 to August 8, 2014, Honma took part in his first G1 Climax as a late replacement for an injured Kota Ibushi, losing all ten of his matches and finishing last in his block.

Honma's struggle in the tournament made him one of the most popular wrestlers in all of NJPW, creating a movement called "Honmania".

In November, Honma took part in the 2014 World Tag League, alongside Togi Makabe.

The two finished last in their block with a record of three wins and four losses.

The series of losses built to a big win on January 4, 2015, at Wrestle Kingdom 9 in Tokyo Dome, where Honma, Hiroyoshi Tenzan and Satoshi Kojima defeated Bullet Club's Bad Luck Fale, Jeff Jarrett and Yujiro Takahashi, with Honma pinning Takahashi for the win.

On February 14 at The New Beginning in Sendai, Honma replaced an ill Togi Makabe in a match for the now vacant NEVER Openweight Championship, but was defeated by Tomohiro Ishii.

During July and August, Honma took part in the 2015 G1 Climax.

After losing his first seven matches in the tournament, Honma finally picked up his first ever win in the tournament over Tomohiro Ishii on August 12.

After losing his final match against Yujiro Takahashi, Honma again finished last in his block with a record of one win and eight losses.