Skip to main content

Shitara Runs Down Defending Champ Nagano to Give Saitama 2018 National Men's Ekiden Title

Half marathon national record holder Yuta Shitara lived up to his pre-race words, running down everyone who stood between him and the finish line to bring Saitama Prefecture its second-ever national title at the 2018 National Men's Ekiden.

Defending champ Nagano, whose win last year gave it a record seven wins in the National Men's Ekiden's 21-year history, was the favorite for the win, its roster packed with members of 2017 National High School Ekiden winner Saku Chosei H.S. and 2017 Izumo Ekiden winner Tokai University. Shitara was unfazed, saying pre-race that he'd run down anyone within 50 seconds of him on the 13.0 km anchor stage.

Nagano started strong, taking 2nd on the opening leg behind a nearly record-setting run from Ryuto Igawa (Kumamoto). Hoping for its first-ever top-three finish Ibaraki was unexpectedly strong, 5th on the leadoff leg, overtaking Nagano on the Second Stage and then advancing to 1st on the Third Stage thanks to a strong run from 2018 Hakone Ekiden Second Stage winner Homare Morita.

Ibaraki held on to 1st on the Fourth Stage, but on next one, the longest high school stage at 8.5 km, it fell victim to Nagano's Yuhi Nakaya, star member of Saku Chosei H.S. with a 5000 m best of 13:47.22. Nakaya and Nagano's sixth runner Haruta Koshi needed to open a lead of around a minute over Saitama to give anchor Hayato Seki a chance of holding Shitara off, but it wasn't to be.

Behind them, Saitama had spent most of the race hovering around 5th after a slow start. 45 seconds behind after Nakaya's stage-winning run, Saitama's sixth runner Shura Shinoki turned it around with a stage-winning 8:50 for the 3.0 km junior high school stage, taking advantage of a weak run from Koshi to pull with 13 seconds of the lead.

That was all Shitara needed, running down Seki and the intervening teams by 2.5 km and then dropping Seki effortlessly at 5.0 km to solo his way to the win in 2:19:10, one second slower than Nagano's winning time last year but still the 4th-fastest winning time in history. Last year Shitara won the 13.0 km anchor stage in 37:43 ahead of an ambitious debut at the Tokyo Marathon. A year older now with a half marathon national record, a 10000 m PB and two sub-2:10 marathons behind him, this year Shitara covered the same course in 37:12. After one last tuneup at the Marugame Half in two weeks Shitara will return to Tokyo, where he plans to take Toshinari Takaoka's 2:06:16 national record and the million-dollar bonus on offer for it.

Struggling after 10 k m, Seki still managed a quality run to keep 2nd for Nagano in 2:19:56, Chiba coming through in 2:20:34 for its best-ever placing at 3rd. Last year's runner-up Fukuoka was 4th in 2:20:55, powered in part by a brilliant Second Stage course record run by 1500 m, 3000 m and 5000 m junior high school national record holder Kosuke Ishida. 2018 Hakone Ekiden First Stage winner Kazuya Nishiyama, a first-year at Toyo University, had another brilliant run to mark him as the inheritor of Shitara's legacy at Toyo, taking the second-fastest anchor time to outkick Yamaguchi and give Gunma 5th overall. Just back, Kanagawa marked its best-ever placing at 7th, with longtime leader Ibaraki dropping to 8th just 1 second ahead of Fukushima. Tokyo rounded out the top ten thanks to a superb finish from 2017 World University Games half marathon gold medalist Kei Katanishi.

With championship ekiden season now wrapped up, like Shitara Japan's top-level men now turn their focus to the half marathon, where places on the 2018 World Half Marathon Championships team are still up for grabs in Marugame and the National Corporate Half Marathon, and the marathon, where the attention is on qualifying for the MGC Race, Japan's new 2020 Olympic Trials for its marathon squad. Along with Suguru Osako (NOP), Shitara looks right now like one of the best bets to make that high-pressure team.

23rd National Men's Ekiden

Hiroshima, 1/21/18
47 teams, 7 stages, 48.0 km
click here for complete results

Top Team Results
1. Saitama - 2:19:10
2. Nagano - 2:19:56
3. Chiba - 2:20:34
4. Fukuoka - 2:20:55
5. Gunma - 2:20:59
6. Yamaguchi - 2:21:01
7. Kanagawa - 2:21:09
8. Ibaraki - 2:21:24
9. Fukushima - 2:21:25
10. Tokyo - 2:21:51

Top Individual Stage Results
First Stage (7.0 km, H.S.)
1. Ryuto Igawa (Kumamoto) - 19:56
2. Sakito Matsuzaki (Nagano) - 20:00
3. Reito Hanzawa (Fukushima) - 20:01

Second Stage (3.0 km, J.H.S.)
1. Kosuke Ishida (Fukuoka) - 8:14 - CR
2. Hiroki Wakabayashi (Wakayama) - 8:28
3. Takanobu Igarashi (Ibaraki) - 8:31
3. Masaya Tsurukawa (Kumamoto) - 8:31

Third Stage (8.5 km, univ/pro)
1. Kazuki Tamura (Yamaguchi) - 23:43
2. Kazuya Shiojiri (Gunma) - 23:49
3. Hiroki Matsueda (Chiba) - 24:09

Fourth Stage (5.0 km, H.S.)
1. Keita Honma (Nagano) - 14:26
2. Kiyoto Suzuki (Ibaraki) - 14:30
2. Shinya Kojima (Osaka) - 14:30

Fifth Stage (8.5 km, H.S.)
1. Yuhi Nakaya (Nagano) - 24:37
2. Takuro Miura (Hyogo) - 24:52
3. Issei Sato (Chiba) - 25:02
3. Koki Kamata (Kanagawa) - 25:02

Sixth Stage (3.0 km, J.H.S.)
1. Shura Shinoki (Saitama) - 8:50
2. Hibiki Yoshida (Shizuoka) - 8:53
2. Keita Sato (Kyoto) - 8:53

Seventh Stage (13.0 km, univ/pro)
1. Yuta Shitara (Saitama) - 37:12
2. Kazuya Nishiyama (Gunma) - 38:01
3. Naoya Takahashi (Fukuoka) - 38:08

© 2018 Brett Larner, all rights reserved
Labels:

Comments

TokyoRacer said…
Yes, that Ishida kid was a joy to watch. Beautiful form, smooth as silk, just flying past the other runners, who were no slouches. Remember that name.
January 22, 2018 at 8:02 AM
Post a Comment

Most-Read This Week

CR Holder Teruki Shimada Returns to Launceston Half - Preview and Streaming

Last year's McGrath Launceston Running Festival Peppers Silo Half Marathon in Tasmania, Australia shaped out into a great Australia vs. Japan dual meet , with Jessica Stenson outrunning Yumi Yoshikawa to take the women's title in a 1:09:51 CR, and Teikyo University school record holder Teruki Shimada executing a tactically brilliant race to drop Isaac Heyne , then-NR holder Brett Robinson , and Teikyo teammate Jinya Ozaki for the win in 1:01:12, just a second off the Australian all-comers record. Marathon NR holder Andy Buchanan took that record down to 1:01:08 at the Gold Coast Half a month later, but its chances of surviving this weekend aren't looking good. Shimada leads last year's top 4 back to Launceston this year, and there's a lot of tough new competition. 2025 National Corporate Half winner Tsubasa Ichiyama , Australia's Haftu Strintzos , new Teikyo record holder Yuta Asakawa and American Ethan Shuley have all run faster that Buchanan's rec...
Post a Comment
Read more

Murayama and Sasaki Making U.S. Debut at New York Mini 10 km

Every year since 2012 that there's been a United Airlines NYC Half , JRN has partnered with the NYRR and November's Ageo City Half Marathon to bring two top-tier collegiate Japanese men to the NYC Half for what's usually been their international debuts. For years we've wanted to extend that program to include top collegiate women, but that has always faced 2 problems. For one, while the half marathon distance is the main focus for Japanese collegiate men due to the stage lengths at the Hakone Ekiden, few collegiate women run it. Those that do run the National University Women's Half Marathon in Matsue, held the same day as the NYC Half. This year, though, we're finally making it happen in a slightly different way. Amisa Murayama and Nazuki Sasaki of 2025 Mt. Fuji Women's Ekiden national collegiate championship runner-up Tohoku Fukushi University are joining the field for the NYRR's Mastercard New York Mini 10 km on June 6. After running an 18:14 CR ...
Post a Comment
Read more

Some Reflections on the Ekiden

by Brett Larner This ekiden season I've had a few thoughts kicking around, and watching this week's Hakone Ekiden a few of them became clearer.  These are still in progress, but at the moment this is what I'm thinking in terms of running as a spectator sport and about the quality of Japanese men's distance running right now. Quality: Japanese men's running is coming up very, very quickly.  I was in the lead car at November's Ageo City Half Marathon , where 18 men, 17 of them university runners, broke 63 minutes.  As it was going on we all thought it was a slow race because there were so many people running that pace all the way, no separation at all in the mass of the pack. See the JRN header photo above, taken just past halfway.  That's pretty unusual in Japan, especially at the university level; generally you'll get a handful of guys who run an aggressive pace and a mass running dead on a safe pace, 3:00/km in a half marathon, for example. Th...
18 comments
Read more