Skip to main content

2010 World Jr. 200 m Champion Iizuka Runs World-Leading 20.21 for All-Time Japanese #3, 18-Year-Old Hashimoto 2nd in 20.35

http://www.nikkansports.com/sports/athletics/news/f-sp-tp0-20130503-1121751.html
http://www.nikkansports.com/sports/athletics/news/f-sp-tp0-20130503-1121759.html

translated and edited by Brett Larner
click here for complete results
videos by naoki620



At the May 3 Shizuoka International Track and Field Meet men's 200 m, 2010 World Junior Championships gold medalist and London Olympian Shota Iizuka (21, Chuo Univ.) won Heat Four in a world-leading meet record time of 20.21 (+1.4 m/s).  A PB by 0.24 seconds, Iizuka's time was enough to put him at all-time #3 on the Japanese lists and would have been good for 7th in the London final.  He easily cleared the Japanese Federation's specified time for Moscow World Championships qualification, 20.29.  "The first time I saw it in print I thought it was really fast," said Iizuka, "but if you can't run that kind of time then you can't be internationally competitive."

Iizuka spent the winter training at warmer locations in the United States and Australia.  If he makes the podium at June's National Track and Field Championships he will be guaranteed a place on the Moscow team.  "Yeah, at Nationals I want to run perfectly and make the team without any questions about it," he said with determination.



In the Shizuoka men's 200 m Heat Three, a shiny brand new first-year university runner wowed the crowd, 18-year-old Akiyuki Hashimoto (Waseda Univ.) winning in 20.35 with a 0.3 m/s headwind, a PB by almost half a second and the third-best mark in the world this year at the time, bumped down to fourth by Iizuka's 20.21 in Heat 4.  Faster than any other runner of the day except Iizuka, Hashimoto also cleared the meet record.  Clearing the 20.52 World Championships A-standard in a virtual Cinderella story, Hashimoto said, "I was trying to make the team for the World University Games, but since things turned out this way I'm going to have to change gears and go for Worlds," the excitement in his voice bursting through his smile.

As a senior at Kagoshima's Sensatsu Seishukan H.S. Hashimoto won last summer's National High School Championships 200 m.  In high school he had many explosive clashes with Yoshihide Kiryu, one year his junior at rival Rakunan H.S. in Kyoto.  Asked about Kiryu tying the 100 m world junior record earlier this week at the Oda Memorial Meet, Hashimoto replied firmly, "That's an incredible time, but it doesn't mean I'm going to lose the next time we line up against each other."

Comments

TokyoRacer said…
We can actually put "Japanese men" and "world sprinting power" in the same sentence? Unbelievable!

Most-Read This Week

Arao Becomes 1st Man in 40 Years to Score Back-to-Back Ome Road Race Wins

30 km is an under-appreciated distance, and both of Japan's big races at that distance happened Sunday. At the Ome Road Race in western Tokyo's mountains, Sydney Marathon 6th-placer Masato Arao (ND Software) became the first man since the great Kunimitsu Ito in 1985-1986 to win back-to-back years. Arao, who finished 39th of 40 on his leg at the New Year Ekiden last month, stayed in the pack through 20 km before going on the attack, putting over a minute on New Year Ekiden Sixth Stage CR breaker Yudai Shimazu (GMO). Sub-1:31 winning times are rare on the tough and hilly Ome course, but Arao's 1:30:54 almost equaled his 1:30:50 from last year, making him the first Japanese man ever to do it twice and second only to CR holder Ezekiel Cheboitibin . Next up Arao races the Tokyo Marathon, where he is targeting sub-2:06. Shimazu was 2nd in 1:31:58 and Yuta Nakayama (JR Higashi Nihon) 3rd in 1:32:07. Cheboitibin was only 9th, running almost 8 minutes off his CR in 1:36:42. Shi...

'Kobe 2024: Aitchison, Athmani Lead Record-Breaking Thursday'

  https://www.paralympic.org/news/kobe-2024-para-athletics-world-championships-aitchison-athmani-lead-record-breaking-thursday Complete results and daily schedule from the Kobe World Para Athletics Championships are here .

Nagoya Women's Marathon Elite Field

Last year's top 3 Sheila Chepkirui , Sayaka Sato and Eunice Chebichii Chumba are back for this year's Nagoya Women's Marathon on Mar. 8, but things are being set up more for it to be a race between Chepkirui, 2:17:49 in Berlin 2023, Aynalem Desta , 2:17:37 in Amsterdam last fall, and Japanese NR holder Honami Maeda , 2:18:59 at the Osaka International Women's Marathon in 2024. Aynalem has the freshest sub-2:20 of the 3, with neither Chepkirui nor Maeda having done it in 2 years. Maeda's only recent result is a 1:10:07 from Houston last month, but when she ran her NR she didn't have any kind of tuneup race to indicate her fitness so it's probably best not to read too much into that. If it goes out as a 2:18 race those are the only 3 who can probably hang with it. If it turns out to be more of a 2:20 race like when Chepkirui won in 2:20:40 last year then there's a group of 7 at the 2:20-2:22 level who will be in the picture, including Chumba, Selly Chep...