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Mountain Runner Ruy Ueda Becomes First Asian to Win Skyrunning World Championships - "I'm Happy to Leave My Name in the History Books"


The Skyrunning World Championships took place July 9th to 11th in Barruera, Spain. Ruy Ueda, a native of Omachi, Nagano, won the overall title, making him the sport's first Asian world champion. 

Ueda placed 1st in the Vertical Kilometer division on the championships' opening day, covering 3.3 km course with 1000 m of elevation in 35:06. That made him the first runner from Asia to win an individual division at the Skyrunning World Championships. Two days later he followed up with a 3rd-place finish in the Sky division, covering the mountainous 42 km course in 4:10:51. Combining his scores from the two races, Ueda was named winner of the overall World Championships title.

In an interview with NBS Ueda was ecstatic, saying, "I'm really happy to leave my name in the Skyrunning history books." As the 2019 Skyrunning World Series champion, Ueda called his win in the Vertical Kilometer division "valuable. Ueda put more focus into the Sky race, but even though the climb portion of the race didn't go well, Ueda said, "It was part of achieving the overall title too, so I had to run up to a certain minimum performance level." 

Ueda has already been named to the Japanese national team for November's Mountain and Trail World Championships in Thailand. "It requires different skills from skyrunning," he said. "I plan to prepare thoroughly so that I'll be in a position to medal."

source article:
translated by Brett Larner

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