Ichirou Miyata

The Lightning God, The Prince of Counters, 宮田一郎

Ichiro Miyata is an out-boxer who is renowned for his speed, timing, and determination. His regular punches are light, but he excels at using counters that could potentially be considered Sunday punches. One of his primary goals as a boxer is to emulate his father, Suzuki Miyata, who was also a boxer before retiring due to a career-ending jaw bone injury. Ichiro takes his training very seriously and adheres to his father's old beliefs that skill can triumph over strength. Despite this, he rarely smiles because he believes that he does not deserve to do so until he wins a boxing match.

Spoilers:

He had worked his way up to almost the top of the featherweight Rookie King championship, until Ryo Mashiba beat him in a match. Miyata ended up in the hospital with a broken foot, as well as some other injuries.Miyata then left Japan to fill the gap between himself and Ippo. He now holds the OPBF Featherweight title and has defended it five times. Due to his promise with Ippo and his determination to prove his father's boxing to the world, Miyata restricts himself to the Featherweights and as a consequence suffers from severe weight control, which lowers his match stamina and strength while making him more susceptible to damage. He was supposed to fight Ippo as promised at that point, but due to a series of events that would come to be called fate, the match didn't happen. Miyata broke his fists in the fight preceding his match with Ippo and took three months off to recover. During that interval, Randy Boy Junior became the Interim Champion. Miyata then cancelled his match with Ippo, much to everyone's confusion.