The National University Women's Ekiden Championships took place Oct. 27 in Sendai, covering a six-stage, 38.1 km course from Koshin Gomu Athlete Park field to Sendai City Hall. Meijo University ran 2:04:34 to better the field by almost three minutes for its third-straight national title. Daito Bunka University was 2nd behind Meijo for the third year in a row, with ten-time national champ Ritsumeikan University taking 3rd. 4th-place Matsuyama University through 8th-place Kansai University joined the top three in earning guaranteed places at the 2020 National Championships.
Meijo started slow, sitting 9th after the opening stage, but its second runner Tomomi Musembi Takamatsu passed eight people to move the defending national champs into 1st. From there to the finish Meijo held on to the lead despite a serious mid-race challenge from Daito Bunka. A stage win from Daito Bunka's third runner Yuka Suzuki brought them within 3 seconds of Meijo, but while fourth runner Yuki Akiyama drew even with Meijo's Yuma Yamamoto the effort proved too much.
Over the second half of the 4.8 km Fourth Stage Akiyama began to drop back, visibly tying up in the final kilometer and falling with just over 100 m to go. After the national attention that similar incidents drew at last year's National Corporate Women's Ekiden Qualifier race officials were quick to rush to Akiyama's side, but with an almost violent swing of her arm she waved them away and got back to her feet to complete the handoff to Daito Bunka's star runner Natsuki Sekiya. Sekiya was quick to make up lost ground and return Daito Bunka to 2nd place, but her best efforts couldn't overcome Meijo's Rika Kaseda, who covered the 9.2 km Fifth Stage 4 seconds faster than Sekiya to preserve Meijo's lead for anchor Yuna Arai.
37th Morinomiyako Ekiden
National University Women's Ekiden ChampionshipsSendai, Miyagi, 10/27/19
26 teams, 6 stages, 38.1 km
complete results
Top Team Results - top 8 seeded for 2020
1. Meijo University - 2:04:34
2. Daito Bunka University - 2:07:05
3. Ritsumeikan University - 2:07:37
4. Matsuyama University - 2:07:45
5. Nittai University - 2:08:40
6. Josai University - 2:09:09
7. Osaka Gakuin University - 2:09:34
8. Kansai University - 2:10:00
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9. Osaka Geijutsu University - 2:10:32
10. Tokyo Nogyo Univsity - 2:10:42
Individual Stage Best Performances
First Stage (6.6 km) - Rino Goshima (Chuo Univ.) - 20:55
Second Stage (3.9 km) - Tomomi Musembi Takamatsu (Meijo Univ.) - 12:20
Third Stage (6.9 km) - Yuka Suzuki (Daito Bunka Univ.) - 21:44
Fourth Stage (4.8 km) - Yuma Yamamoto (Meijo Univ.) - 15:47
Fifth Stage (9.2 km) - Rika Kaseda (Meijo Univ.) - 29:49
Sixth Stage (6.7 km) - Momoka Mitsugi (Josai Univ.) - 22:45
source article:
https://www.sponichi.co.jp/sports/news/2019/10/28/kiji/20191028s00063000055000c.html
translated and edited by Brett Larner
Comments
I think Daito are a lot closer to Meijo than the result indicates. But Daito shot themselves in the foot with a poorly managed run from their starter Reimi Yoshimura. She tried to go with Goshima in the early stages, which is admirable, but completely unnecessary because her one mission was to get as far as possible in front of Meijo's Narumi Kobayashi. Yoshimura dropped away in the second half of the leg and was only able to finish nine seconds in front of Kobayashi. On PB's she should have been 20 to 25 seconds in front of her.
Yoshimura is a good runner, but I think she got her run wrong. After that it just made things a bit easier for Meijo.
As for Yuki Akiyama...She looked pretty cooked early on in that leg. I feel like there may have been a bigger problem aside from over running, which obviously did not help.