Skip to main content

Kyoto Wins National Women's Ekiden Title for 17th Time


Bringing together everyone from the top junior high school runners to the pros, the National Women's Ekiden took place in Kyoto on Jan. 12. Hosts Kyoto outran Miyagi and Tokyo to win the national title for the 17th time, extending its lead as the winningest team in the National Women's Ekiden 38-year history.

The race started and finished at Kyoto's Takebishi Stadium, covering the full marathon distance in nine stages. Teams from all 47 prefectures competed for the national title. On the First Stage, Nagasaki's Ririka Hironaka, who last month cleared the Tokyo Olympics 5000 m qualifying standard, opened a lead of over 30 seconds on 2nd place and broke the stage record dating back to 2003.

Nagasaki held the lead over the next two stages, but near the end of the Fourth Stage they were run down by Nagano. On the Fifth Stage high school 3rd-year Rina Kimura tied the stage record to take Miyagi from 3rd past Nagano into 1st. But from the Fifth through Seventh stages a trio of runners from Kyoto's Ritsumeikan Uji H.S. ran stage-winning times, including stage record ties by Fifth Stage runner Azusa Mihara and Seventh Stage runner Yu Muramatsu, to move up through the field, putting junior high schooler Ai Segawa into position to take over the lead.

Kyoto anchor Mao Ichiyama from the Wacoal corporate team ran conservatively to protect the team's leading position, bringing them home for a record-setting 17th national title in 2:16:15. Miyagi was 10 seconds back in 2nd, with Tokyo another 11 seconds behind in 3rd.

38th National Women's Ekiden

Kyoto, 1/12/20
47 teams, 9 stages, 42.195 km
complete results

Top Individual Stage Results
First Stage (6.0 km) - Ririka Hironaka (Nagasaki) - 18:39 - CR
Second Stage (4.0 km ) - Yuri Tasaki (Miyazaki) - 12:32
Third Stage (3.0 km) - Akari Matsumoto (Oita) - 9:19
Fourth Stage (4.0 km) - Haruka Kokai (Miyagi) - 12:54
Fifth Stage (4.1075 km) -Azusa Mihara (Kyoto) - 12:55 - CR tie
Sixth Stage (4.0875 km) - Tomo Muramatsu (Kyoto) - 12:57
Seventh Stage (4.0 km) - Yu Muramatsu (Kyoto) - 12:21 - CR tie
Eighth Stage (3.0 km) - Yumi Yamamoto (Oita) - 10:00
Ninth Stage (10.0 km) - Hitomi Niiya (Tokyo) - 30:57

Top Team Results
1. Kyoto - 2:16:15
2. Miyagi - 2:16:25
3. Tokyo - 2:16:36
4. Nagano - 2:16:37
5. Kagoshima - 2:17:04
6. Hyogo - 2:17:42
7. Gunma - 2:17:56
8. Osaka - 2:17:55
9. Okayama - 2:18:06
10. Nagasaki - 2:18:08

source article:
https://www3.nhk.or.jp/news/html/20200112/k10012243171000.html
translated by Brett Larner

Buy Me A Coffee
Labels:

Comments

Post a Comment

Most-Read This Week

19-Yr-Old Munakata Breaks Miura's U20 NR to Win Ageo City Half Marathon

The Ageo City Half Marathon is always big, the main race that the coaches of Hakone Ekiden-bound university men's teams use for firming up their entry rosters for the big show. That makes what's basically an idyllic small town race into one of the world's great road races, with depth unmatched anywhere. One of the top-tier people on the start list at 1:02:07, Kodai Miyaoka (Hosei Univ.) took the race out fast, but the entire pack was keying off the fastest man in the race, Reishi Yoshida (Chuo Gakuin Univ.), 1:00:31. Yoshida reeled Miyaoka in before 5 km and kept things steady in the low-1:01 range, wearing down the lead group to around 10 including his CGU teammate Taisei Ichikawa , a quartet from Izumo and National University Ekiden runner-up Komazawa University , 2 runners from local Daito Bunka University , 2:07:54 marathoner Atsumi Ashiwa (Honda), and Australian Ed Goddard . Right after 15 km Komazawa went into action, Yudai Kiyama , Hibiki Murakami and Haru Tanin
Post a Comment
Read more

Ageo City Half Marathon Preview and Streaming

This weekend's big race is the Ageo City Half Marathon , the next stop on the collegiate men's circuit. Most of the universities bound for the Jan. 2-3 Hakone Ekiden use Ageo to thin down the list of contenders for their final Hakone rosters, and with JRN's development program that sends the first two Japanese collegiate finishers in Ageo to the United Airlines NYC Half every year a lot of coaches put in some of their A-listers too. That gives Ageo legendary depth and fast front-end speed, with a 1:00:47 course record last year from Kenyan corporate leaguer Paul Kuira (JR Higashi Nihon) and the top 26 all clearing 63 minutes. Since a lot of programs just enter everybody on their rosters you never really know who on the entry list is actually going to show up, but if even a quarter of the people at the top end of this year's list run it'll be a great race, even if conditions are looking likely to be a bit warmer than ideal. Chuo Gakuin University 's Reishi Yoshi
Post a Comment
Read more

10000 m NR Attempt In the Works Saturday at Hachioji Long Distance - Streaming and Preview

There are a bunch of other time trial meets this weekend and next, but Saturday's Hachioji Long Distance is the last big meet for Japanese men, 8 heats of Wavelight-paced 10000 m finely graded from target times of 28:50 down to 26:59 for the fastest heat. Heat 6 at 17:55 local time is effectively the B-race, with 35 Japan-based Kenyans targeting 27:10 at the front end, and in a lot of cases a spot on their teams at the New Year Ekiden national championship on Jan. 1. Corporate teams are only allowed to field one non-Japanese athlete in the New Year Ekiden, and only on its shortest stage, and getting to that has a big impact on African athletes' contracts and renewal prospects. Toyota Boshoku , Yasukawa Denki , Chugoku Denryoku , Aisan Kogyo , JR Higashi Nihon , Subaru and 2024 national champion Toyota are all fielding two Kenyans, and Aichi Seiko three. For people like Toyota's Felix Korir and Samuel Kibathi , getting as close to the 27:10 target time as they can and
Post a Comment
Read more