Skip to main content

Rikuren Announces Japanese Team for Asian Championships

by Brett Larner

On June 15 Rikuren released the lineup of the Japanese team for next month's Asian Athletics Championships, to be held July 7-10 in Kobe. The long distance squads are overall strong, with the men's team in particular featuring the top three Japanese men from both the 5000 m and 10000 m at last weekend's National Championships. The women's team includes the 2nd through 4th place women from the National Championships 5000 m, missing just winner Megumi Kinukawa (Team Mizuno), but is weaker in the 10000 m as only the 4th and 5th-place finishers from Nationals are on the list. A conspicuous absence from both Nationals and the Asian Championships team is top-ranked Kayoko Fukushi (Team Wacoal).

2011 Asian Athletics Championships - Japanese National Team
July 7-10, Kobe, Hyogo

Men's Long Distance
Kazuya Watanabe (Team Shikoku Denryoku)
Yuki Sato (Team Nissin Shokuhin)
Tetsuya Yoroizaka (Meiji Univ.)
Akinobu Murasawa (Tokai Univ.)
Tsuyoshi Ugachi (Team Konica Minolta)
Tsuyoshi Takeda (Suzuki Hamamatsu AC)
Hiroyoshi Umegae (Team NTN)
Aoi Matsumoto (Team Otsuka Seiyaku)

Women's Long Distance
Hitomi Niiya (Chiba Pref.)
Yuriko Kobayashi (Team Toyota Jidoshokki)
Rei Ohara (Team Tenmaya)
Kaoru Nagao (Team Univ. Ent.)
Hitomi Nakamura (Team Panasonic)
Minori Hayakari (Kyoto Koka AC)
Misato Horie (Team Noritz)

Men's Middle Distance
Masato Yokota (Team Fujitsu)
Takeshi Kuchino (Team Fujitsu)
Hiroshi Ino (Team Fujitsu)
Yuya Konishi (Team Toyota Kyushu)

Women's Middle Distance
Akari Kishikawa (Hasegawa AC)
Ruriko Kubo (Team Edion)
Mika Kobayashi (Suma Gakuen H.S.)
Akane Yabushita (Ritsumeikan Univ.)

Men's Sprints
Masahi Eriguchi (Team Osaka Gas)
Yusuke Kotani (Ritsumeikan Univ.)
Sota Kawatsura (Chuo Univ.)
Hitoshi Saito (Team Sunmesse)
Yuichi Kobayashi (Hosei Univ.)
Shota Iizuka (Chuo Univ.)
Yuzo Kanemaru (Team Otsuka Seiyaku)
Hideyuki Hirose (Keio Univ.)
Yusuke Ishitsuka (Team Mizuno)
Shinji Takahira (Team Fujitsu)
Kei Takase (Team Fujitsu)

Women's Sprints
Kana Ichikawa (Chukyo Univ.)
Nao Okabe (Team Mizuno)
Momoko Takahashi (Team Fujitsu)
Chisato Fukushima (Hokkaido Hi-Tec AC)
Saori Imai (Gakukan Univ.)
Mio Shingu (Higashi Osaka Univ.)
Chisato Tanaka (Team Kyudenko)
Sayaka Aoki (Team Toho Ginko)

Men's Hurdles
Wataru Yazawa (Hosei Univ.)
Kenji Yahata (Team Monteroza)
Takayuki Kishimoto (Hosei Univ.)
Yuta Imazaki (Team Aima)
Takatoshi Abe (Chukyo Univ.)

Women's Hurdles
Ayako Kimura (Team Edion)
Airi Ito (Kansai Univ.)
Satomi Kubokura (Niigata Albirex AC)
Miyabe Tago (J. Vic AC)
Shiori Miki (Higashi Osaka Univ.)

(c) 2011 Brett Larner
all rights reserved

Comments

Most-Read This Week

World Marathon Majors Japanese Entries

We're back from a short summer break. A week and a half out from the first race of the season's four World Marathon Majors races, here's a look at Japanese athletes scheduled to run. Everything right now is about qualifying for the MGC Race, the official trials race for the 2028 Los Angeles Olympics to be held in the fall of 2027 in Nagoya. The JAAF makes no mistake about wanting to keep its top people racing domestically where it can get a share of revenue from the TV broadcast and race operations, so anyone who decides to race overseas has to do it in a WA platinum label race and hit either 2:06:30 or 2:23:30, regardless of place, course or weather if they want to make the trials. At the same time concessions are make for domestic races, like for example the late-August Hokkaido Marathon where up to 3 men and 3 women can qualify if they go 2:12:00 or 2:32:00. As a result, you get things like last year where amateur runner Yudai Fukuda made the trials by finishing 3rd Jap...

Nakajima Breaks 100 mH NR Twice, Kitaguchi Returns - August Track Roundup

Catching up on what's been happening in track and field this month during our summer break: Men's 3000 m NR holder Nagiya Mori was just off his 5000 m PB at the IFAM Oordegem meet in Belgium on Aug. 1, taking 16th in 13:15.01. Shota Nakano was 26th of 28 in 13:35.02. This year's national champion Ryoma Aoki ran the 3000 mSC but didn't finish. Naoto Hasegawa was the only Japanese athlete at Mutaz Essa Barshim 's What Gravity Tour stop at the Monaco Athletics Festival meet on Aug. 5. Having cleared 2.30 m for the first time earlier this year Hasegawa only managed 2.18 m in Monaco, taking 7th of 10. There were a lot of good performances at the Fuji Hokuriku World Trial meet in Fujiyoshida on Aug. 9, but the one that got the headlines was a 12.62 (-0.2) NR in the women's 100 mH by Hitomi Nakajima . Nakajima actually did it twice, running 12.62 (+2.0) in the heats before repeating in the final. Masumi Aoki also ran big in the heats, with a 12.68 (+2.0) for al...

Asian Games Competition Schedule

The daily athletics event schedule for September's Aichi-Nagoya Asian Games . Wednesday, Sept. 23 7:30 - Women's / Men's Half Marathon Race Walk Final Thursday, Sept. 24 10:00 - Women's Heptathlon 100 mH 10:20 - Mixed 4x400 m Relay Heats 10:30 - Men's Triple Jump Heats 10:40 - Women's Heptathlon High Jump 19:05 - Men's High Jump Heats 19:13 - Women's Heptathlon Shot Put 19:33 - Women's 100 m Heats 19:44 - Women's Triple Jump Final 20:08 - Men's 100 m Heats 20:55 - Men's Discus Throw Final 21:00 - Women's Heptathlon 200 m 21:25 - Women's 10000 m Final 22:15 - Mixed 4x400 m Relay Final Friday, Sept. 25 10:00 - Women's Heptathlon Long Jump 10:30 - Men's 400 m Heats 11:25 - Women's Heptathlon Javelin Throw 19:05 - Women's Shot Put Final 19:13 - Women's 100 m Semifinal 19:33 - Men's 100 m Semifinal 20:03 - Women's Pole Vault Final 20:11 - Women's Heptathlon 800 m 20:32 - Men's 10000 m Final 20:40 - M...