Sunday is the first big women's ekiden of the season, the Princess Ekiden in Sendai, the qualifying race for November's National Corporate Women's Ekiden Championships. The top 8 teams from last year's Nationals are already qualified, and at the Princess Ekiden another 16 will join them. 31 teams will be competing over 42.195 km in 6 stages, with the race broadcast live by TBS starting at 11:50 local time. Streaming will happen on Youtube, live results will be here, and JRN will be covering it live @JRNLive.
Up near the front third of the field, the teams that made Nationals last year, the top 12 or so teams look pretty secure for qualifying. 11th at Nationals last year, Edion is looking especially strong with track Olympian Kaede Hagitani, 2:21:42 marathoner Ai Hosoda and new transfer from the Denso team Mikuni Yada, a 15:19.67/31:34.39 runner, on its entry list. Daiichi Seimei also has two solid new recruits from Daito Bunka University, Yuka Suzuki and Natsuki Sekiya, and should be stronger than last year.
Down around the bottom few spots things start getting interesting. You've got a mixture of teams like Kyocera and Panasonic that used to top-ranked but have fallen on harder times, mid-level teams like Shimamura that have picked up new talent, in Shimamura's case 31:16.48 10000 m runner Minami Yamanouchi from Kyocera, and newer teams like Daiso and SID Group trying to pick up a qualifying position. Tokyo Metro and Senko are both very new teams at the bottom of the field, Senko in particular having put together an interesting lineup that includes Arisu Fuwa, older sister of collegiate 10000 m NR holder Seira Fuwa.
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