Professional Wrestling Career
He was one of the first dojo trainees at New Japan Pro Wrestling, being known as Little Hamada in the beginning. He was sent to Mexico's Universal Wrestling Association because of his lack of size, and he found a lot of success there - so much so that Mexican fans and promoters began calling him Gran Hamada (Great Hamada). He also competed in Empresa Mexicana de Lucha Libre, which added El (The) to the front of his name: El Gran Hamada.
In 1984 he became a member of the initial roster of the original Japanese UWF, but found that his flamboyantly acrobatic style clashed with the martial arts-inspired style and focus on realism of the UWF, and soon left for All Japan Pro Wrestling. He eventually broke off from AJPW to form his own promotion in 1990: Universal Lucha Libre. However, wrestlers began to leave the ULL in 1993, and in 1995 Hamada closed the promotion to join Michinoku Pro, which had been formed by former ULL wrestlers. On April 13, 1997, Hamada teamed with Great Sasuke and Masato Yakushiji (who substituted for Gran Naniwa, who was injured) to defeat Taka Michinoku, Dick Togo and Mens Teioh (aka "Terry Boy") at ECW Barely Legal.
In 2001 he began competing for All Japan again, this time as a free agent. He briefly was part of the "Love Machines" stable under a mask as "Mini Love Machine" with "Super Love Machine" (Junji Hirata of New Japan, reprising his old role as "Super Strong Machine") and "Love Machine Storm" (Arashi, whose stage name literally means "storm"). They used Morning Musume's hit song "Love Machine" as their entrance theme. He would also briefly work for New Japan Pro Wrestling's Wrestle Land brand as Makai Masked Hurricane but only wrestled two shows under that name.
His daughters Xochitl and Ayako, who are half-Mexican, are also professional wrestlers.
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