Japanese Athletes in Action on Tokyo World Championships Day 8

It's getting near the end of the Tokyo World Athletics Championships, and with only one bronze medal so far the host country's chances of the kind of team performance it was hoping for are fading. A look at who's in action on Day 8:

7:30 - Women's 20 km Race Walk

Nanako Fujii (Edion) - 1:26:33 - 1st, Nationals

Kumiko Okada (Fujitsu) - 1:28:17 - 2nd, Nationals

Ayane Yanai (Ritsumeikan Univ.) - 1:29:44 - 4th, Nationals

Prognosis: Fujii's win at this year's National Championships makes her the fastest woman in the field on SB and 2nd on PB. Okada and Yanai aren't likely to factor into the top 8, but Fujii is a realistic medal contender.

9:00 / 10:35 - Men's Discus Throw Qualification

Masateru Yugami (Toyota) - 64.48 m - 3rd, Nationals

Prognosis: Yugami made it into the Worlds field on a host country slot and is ranked 3rd from its bottom. He's had a decent season, and while there's almost no chance of him making the final a PB in front of a home crowd would be a great showing.

9:50 - Men's 20 km Race Walk

Toshikazu Yamanishi (Aichi Seiko) - 1:16:10 - 1st, Nationals

Satoshi Maruo (Aichi Seiko) - 1:17:24 - 2nd, Nationals

Kento Yoshikawa (Sunbelx) - 1:17:38 - 3rd, Nationals

Prognosis: The only man in the field to have broken 1:17, it's Yamanishi's race to lose. Maruo, doubling back from the 35 km, is next on both PB and SB and Yoshikawa 5th, so the chances of at least one medal are looking pretty good. Especially with the unfortunate withdrawal of 35 km gold medalist Evan Dunfee of Canada with injuries he sustained in pushing through the last 10 km of that race.

19:35 - Men's 4x400 m Relay Heats

Yuki Joseph Nakajima (Fujitsu) - 44.44 - 5th, Nationals

Fuga Sato (Mizuno) - 45.10 - 1st, Nationals

Kenki Imaizumi (Uchida Yoko AC) - 45.29 - 2nd, Nationals

Sho Tanabe (Chuo Univ.) - 45.39 - 3rd, Nationals

Takuho Yoshizu (Miki House) - 45.40 - 4th, Nationals

Kentaro Sato (Fujitsu) - 45.40 - 4th, H2, Nationals

Shinya Hayashi (Tsukuba Univ.) - 45.65 - 6th, Nationals

Prognosis: The men's 4x400 m has been coming up in recent years, not quite to the level of the 4x100 m but getting there. Nakajima is in great shape with a 44.44 NR in the heats and making the final in the individual race and Fuga Sato running a 45.10 SB in his heat. But without Kentaro Sato in peak form there's a gap in the lineup that may be too big to patch up this time around.

20:25 - Men's 4x100 m Relay Heats

Abdul Hakim Sani Brown (Toray) - 9.96 (+0.5) - 4th, Heat 7, Nationals

Yoshihide Kiryu (Nihon Seimei) - 9.99 (+1.5) - 1st, Nationals

Yuhi Mori (Daito Bunka Univ.) - 10.00 (+1.3) - 7th, Nationals

Hiroki Yanagita (Toyo Univ.) - 10.00 (+0.3) - DQ, Nationals

Sorato Shimizu (Seiryo H.S.) - 10.00 (+1.7) - 4th, SF3, Nationals

Yuki Koike (Sumitomo Denko) - 10.08 (+0.3) - 5th, Nationals

Naoki Inoue (Waseda Univ.) - 10.12 (+0.4) - 4th, Nationals

Naoki Okami (Aomori Pref. Gov't) 10.17 (+0.9) - 2nd, Nationals

Prognosis: The 100 m was a tough squad to make this time, with 3 people running 10.00 PBs behind sub-10 men Sani Brown and Kiryu, so it was a bit disappointing that nobody made the semifinals. It was pretty clear that Sani Brown wasn't in good form in the 100 m, but even without him there are the seeds of a good 4x100 m team between Kiryu, Mori, Yanagita and Shimizu.

21:29 - Women's 5000 m Final

Nozomi Tanaka (New Balance) - 14:31.88 - 1st, Nationals

Prognosis: A top 8 placing by NR holder Tanaka would be a great showing, with her PB ranking her 9th in the field and her SB 15th.

70th Yamagata-ken Judan Ekiden

The 70th running of the Yamagata-ken Judan Ekiden happened over the start of the Golden Week holidays, a 3-day, 29-leg race covering 306.9 km around the northern prefecture of Yamagata. There used to be a lot more of these races where people from the prefecture run for their hometown teams on a Tour de Whatever prefecture or area it happens to be held in, but Yamagata's is one of the few to have survived this long. And amazingly enough, local broadcaster YBC live streamed the entire thing on Youtube. There aren't many corporate teams in the mostly rural area, so runners from the ND Software corporate team played a heavy role, its 2 best runners Masato Arao and Ryoma Takeuchi winning their stages on Day 2 with Takeuchi doubling to anchor the Kita-Murayama team to an overall 5th-place finish, and Koichi Shoji breaking the 2nd leg CR on Day 1 and winning the 2nd-to-last stage on Day 3 to play a key role in the Yamagata city team taking the overall win in 16:06:51, 3:09/km ...

Ochiai, Kawamura, Usuki and Mishima Set NR - Golden Week Track Roundup

There was a lot of action on the track over Japan's Golden Week holidays. Highlights: Shizuoka International Meet - Fukuroi, 3 May Men's 800 m NR holder Ko Ochiai (Komazawa Univ.) broke his own record with a 1:43.90 win. Daigo Usuki (18 Ginko) and Gakuto Mishima (Nippatsu) both broke the NR in the T20 men's 400 m, Usuki getting the win in 49.08 and Mishima 2nd in 49.15. Lauren Bruce (New Zealand) threw a meet record 67.44 m on her final attempt in the women's hammer throw, but even her shortest throw of 64.31 m was over 3 m better than the rest of the field. Kazuki Kurokawa (Sumitomo Denko) got the men's 400 mH meet record with a 48.50 for the win. Women's 3000 mSC NR holder Miu Saito (Panasonic) won the steeple in 9:31.83, the 2nd-best time in her career so far, despite falling. 2nd through 4th all broke 10 minutes. National University Men's Ekiden Kanto Region Qualifier - Hiratsuka, 4 May The top 8 teams at November's National University Men...

April Track Roundup

Four big meets with distance action happened across Japan over the 2nd half of April. Highlights from each of them: Hyogo Relay Carnival - Kobe, 18-19 April Hirokazu Sakai (Senko) set a 2.25 m MR in the men's high jump. Sae Takemoto (Orico) threw 59.68 m to set a new MR in the women's javelin throw. Distance events were pretty low-key, with Ryota Natori (Konica Minolta) winning the men's 10000 m in 28:49.74 and Yuzu Nishide (Daihatsu) the women's 5000 m in 15:44.03. National University Individual Championships - Hiratsuka, 24-26 April Miori Kida (1st yr., Juntendo Univ.) debuted with 4:19.14 MR in the women's 1500 m, going 0.12 under the previous record set last year. Sarah Wanjiru (4th yr., Daito Bunka Univ.) kicked off her senior year by chopping 25 seconds off her own 10000 m MR to by over a minute in 31:23.69. Mao Kimura (1st yr., Meijo Univ.) had a great debut in 32:31.56 for 2nd, more than 70 sec up on 3rd place. Shunpei Yamaguchi (3rd yr., Waseda ...

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