In the midst of rapidly rising new coronavirus infection numbers, Osaka held the 88th edition of its prefectural track and field championships at the massive Nagai Stadium over Thursday and Friday's national holidays. Not usually a big draw for high-level talent, the lack of racing opportunities these days meant more big names than usual, including 2017 and 2019 World Championships men's 4x100 m bronze medalist Shuhei Tada (Sumitomo Denko), who won the 100 m final in 10.46 (-0.5), and women's discus throw national record holder Nanaka Kori (Kyushu Kyoritsu Univ.), who dropped one of ten new meet records at the meet, six by women and four by men. A breakdown of the new records:
Seika Aoyama (Osaka Seikei AC) ran the second-fastest 400 m time ever by a Japanese woman, 52.38, to win her qualifying heat in meet record time, going on to win the final in 54.11.
Yuzu Nishide (Kansai Gaikokugo Univ.) took almost 15 seconds off the women's 3000 m steeplechase meet record, winning in 10:15.22 a day after winning the 1500 m final in 4:23.51.
Kanae Tatsuta (Nippatsu) tied the women's pole vault meet record, clearing 4.10 m on her second attempt.
Sumire Hata (Shibata Kogyo) jumped 6.25 m (+1.3) on her fourth attempt to break the ancient 1981 women's long jump meet record of 6.01 m set by Atsuko Okada after having already bumped it up to 6.07 m (-0.7) on her second attempt. Hata's last jump was also over Okada's record at 6.18 m (+0.4).
National record holder Nanaka Kori (Kyushu Kyoritsu Univ.) improved the women's discus meet record to 52.34, well off her best but almost 4 m over the old record.
Yuka Sato (Nikonikonori) had multiple throws over the women's javelin throw meet record of 57.36 m she set last year, Sato's best one coming on her fourth attempt with a new record of 58.43 m.
Masashi Nonaka (Osaka Gas) took down another of the older records in the meet, breaking Makoto Michiura's 1992-era 5000 m record in 13:55.51, the only man to go under 14 minutes.
Ryo Hamanishi (Meiji Univ.) became the first man to break 20 minutes in the Osaka Championships 5000 m race walk, clocking 19:53.00 to break the meet record set last year by Takumi Suzuki.
Another antique record fell in the men's long jump, where Kazuma Adachi (Kwasei Gakuin Univ.) jumped 7.91 m (+1.7) to better the 7.75 m meet record set by Masaki Morinaga in 1994. All three of Adachi's legal jumps were over Morinaga's mark, the winning one coming on his third attempt.
Mutsuki Harada (Kiyokawa Co.) cleared the men's triple jump meet record on his final attempt, jumping 15.96 m (+1.1) for the win.
Complete results from the 88th Osaka Track and Field Championships can be found here.
© 2020 Brett Larner, all rights reserved
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