Skip to main content

Sekisui Kagaku Wins First Queens Ekiden Title, Defending Champ Japan Post 4th


The 41st edition of the 6-stage, 42.195 km National Corporate Women's Ekiden Championships took place Nov. 28 in Sendai, Miyagi. 28 teams took part, with Sekisui Kagaku running a course record 2:13:03 to win its first national title. Shiseido was 52 seconds behind in 2nd and Denso 3rd, with 2-time defending champ Japan Post coming up short of a three-peat at 4th.

On the race's longest and most competitive stage, the 10.9 km Third Stage, Sekisui Kagaku's Sayaka Sato took over the lead, and solid runs from the rest of its runners helped protect the team's lead all the way to the end. 

Queens Ekiden

41st National Corporate Women's Ekiden Championships
Sendai, Miyagi, 28 Nov., 2021
28 teams, 6 stages, 42.195 km

Top Individual Stage Performances
First Stage (7.6 km) - Harumi Okamoto (Yamada Holdings) - 23:52
Second Stage (3.3 km) - Ran Urabe (Sekisui Kagaku) - 10:07 - CR
Third Stage (10.9 km) - Ririka Hironaka (Japan Post) - 34:24
Fourth Stage (3.6 km) - Teresia Muthoni (Daiso) - 10:53 CR tie
Fifth Stage (10.0 km) - Rino Goshima (Shiseido) - 31:28 - CR
Sixth Stage (6.795 km) - Momoko Watanabe (Tenmaya) - 21:01

Top Team Performances - top 8 auto-qualify for 2022
1. Sekisui Kagaku - 2:13:03 - CR
2. Shiseido - 2:13:55
3. Denso - 2:15:03
4. Japan Post - 2:15:35
5. Daihatsu - 2:15:47
6. Yamada Holdings - 2:16:24
7. Universal Entertainment - 2:16:37
8. Wacoal - 2:16:44
-----
9. Mitsui Sumitomo Kaijo - 2:17:16
10. Uniqlo - 2:17:24
11. Edion - 2:17:34
12. Tenmaya - 2:17:37
13. Daiichi Seimei - 2:17:42
14. Kyudenko - 2:17:50

source article:
translated by Brett Larner

Buy Me A Coffee

Comments

Stefan said…
What a great victory to the Sekisui team and what a great third leg from Sayaka Sato. She was only 5 seconds shy of Ririka Hironaka's time. Her run was critical to the team and she delivered big time. I've been watching her for a while and she is always consistently performing well and improving ever so slightly. It was a wonderful team effort from the Sekisui team. Ran Urabe did an excellent in the 2nd leg to break the Course Record and so did Hitomi Niiya to be one second shy of the best run in the 5th leg. Great run considering her disappointment at the Olympics. It appears Mao Ichiyama and Ayuko Suzuki are suffering from post Olympic blues which is understandable. Perhaps motivation or injury/fatigue has taken their toll?

I noticed the absence of Honami Maeda in the Tenmaya team. Is she injured?

TBS did an excellent job with their YouTube coverage.

Most-Read This Week

World Marathon Majors Japanese Entries

We're back from a short summer break. A week and a half out from the first race of the season's four World Marathon Majors races, here's a look at Japanese athletes scheduled to run. Everything right now is about qualifying for the MGC Race, the official trials race for the 2028 Los Angeles Olympics to be held in the fall of 2027 in Nagoya. The JAAF makes no mistake about wanting to keep its top people racing domestically where it can get a share of revenue from the TV broadcast and race operations, so anyone who decides to race overseas has to do it in a WA platinum label race and hit either 2:06:30 or 2:23:30, regardless of place, course or weather if they want to make the trials. At the same time concessions are make for domestic races, like for example the late-August Hokkaido Marathon where up to 3 men and 3 women can qualify if they go 2:12:00 or 2:32:00. As a result, you get things like last year where amateur runner Yudai Fukuda made the trials by finishing 3rd Jap...

Nakajima Breaks 100 mH NR Twice, Kitaguchi Returns - August Track Roundup

Catching up on what's been happening in track and field this month during our summer break: Men's 3000 m NR holder Nagiya Mori was just off his 5000 m PB at the IFAM Oordegem meet in Belgium on Aug. 1, taking 16th in 13:15.01. Shota Nakano was 26th of 28 in 13:35.02. This year's national champion Ryoma Aoki ran the 3000 mSC but didn't finish. Naoto Hasegawa was the only Japanese athlete at Mutaz Essa Barshim 's What Gravity Tour stop at the Monaco Athletics Festival meet on Aug. 5. Having cleared 2.30 m for the first time earlier this year Hasegawa only managed 2.18 m in Monaco, taking 7th of 10. There were a lot of good performances at the Fuji Hokuriku World Trial meet in Fujiyoshida on Aug. 9, but the one that got the headlines was a 12.62 (-0.2) NR in the women's 100 mH by Hitomi Nakajima . Nakajima actually did it twice, running 12.62 (+2.0) in the heats before repeating in the final. Masumi Aoki also ran big in the heats, with a 12.68 (+2.0) for al...

Federation Tells World Championships Marathoner Horibata To Go On Diet

http://hochi.yomiuri.co.jp/sports/etc/news/20110307-OHT1T00258.htm translated by Brett Larner Having made the 2011 World Championships marathon team by running a PB of 2:09:25 to come in 3rd overall and as the top Japanese finisher at the Mar. 6 Lake Biwa Mainichi Marathon, Hiroyuki Horibata (24, Team Asahi Kasei), talked to the media at Osaka Airport on Mar. 7. Following Sunday's race Rikuren director Keisuke Sawaki , 67, told Horibata, "Let's cut things down a bit until the World Championships," directing him to go on a diet. The 189 cm Horibata weighs 72 kg [~6'3", 160 lbs]. When he joined Team Asahi Kasei in 2005 at age 18 he weighed 65 kg, and this weight is still generally listed on his profile at races and in the media. "For some reason it never changes," he said with a grin. His coach Takeshi Soh , 58, commented, "If he was hungrier for glory his world would change completely," slapping the 'heavyweight division runner...