Already the course record-breaker at the Izumo Ekiden and National University Ekiden this season, 2021 Hakone Ekiden champion Komazawa University came one step away from its first-ever triple crown of single-season ekiden wins as it won a highly competitive 2023 Hakone Ekiden Day One over defending champ Aoyama Gakuin University and last year's 6th placer Chuo University.
Things got off to an unexpected start when Select Team runner Hayate Nitta of non-qualifier Ikuei University decided to take his one and only Hakone shot and run it up to his ability on the 21.3 km 1st leg even though the rest of the field opted to jog. At one point Nitta had a lead of almost a minute and a half, but as beautiful as it would have been for him to pull it off, Meiji University's Shunpei Tomita and Komazawa's Kensuke Tsubura still managed to run him down in the final kilometer. Tomita took the stage win in 1:02:44, 1:02:08 half marathon pace vs. his 1:02:10 PB despite the slow start.
Last year's 1st leg CR breaker Yamato Yoshii was on the 23.1 km 2nd leg for Chuo this year, and he quickly made up the 9-second deficit to Komazawa's Ren Tazawa, last year's 2nd leg winner. Yoshii went right by Tazawa and ran down Meiji's Daiki Ozawa for the lead around 3 km into the stage, but just past 12 km Tazawa was back. As Tazawa pulled away Yoshii got more company from AGU's Kotaro Kondo around 14 km, and as they went back and forth they regained ground on Tazawa.
The uphill final km was a three-way race, but Yoshii came out on top, handing off 3 seconds ahead of Kondo and 4 ahead of Tazawa. All three were under 1:07, a rarity on Hakone's most competitive stage, with Yoshii's time equating to an uphill 1:00:37 half marathon. You almost never get two of the top guys head-to-head the entire way on the 2nd leg, let alone three. It was a sign of how high-level the 2nd leg was this year, and of how much things have changed over the last two generations of collegiate men, that the top Kenyan on the stage, Yamanashi Gakuin University's Boniface Mulwa, ran the equivalent of a 1:01:32 half marathon, just off his 1:01:17 CR at November's Ageo City Half Marathon, but was only 5th on the stage behind Yoshii, Kondo, Tazawa, and Tokai University's Shotaro Ishihara. This was one they'll be showing in the highlight reels for years.
Chuo's next runner Shota Nakano unexpectedly front-ran his way to a stage best on the 21.4 km 3rd leg, his 1:01:51 taking Chuo's lead over Komazawa to 10 seconds and worth a 1:00:59 half marathon. Komazawa's Kotaro Shinohara dropped AGU's Shungo Yokota late in the stage to open 26 seconds on the defending champs. His 1:01:58 equalled a 1:01:05 half marathon just off his 1:01:01 best.
On the 20.9 km 4th leg Komazawa's Mebuki Suzuki, 13:27.83 and 27:41.68 on the track and back from a long injury, took his time reeling in Chuo's Shunsuke Yoshii, the younger brother of its 2nd leg winner. When he did he backed off a bit, letting AGU's Aoi Ota make up the ground between them. Once Ota entered orbit Suzuki went with him, leaving Yoshii fading away behind them. It was almost a replay of the 2nd leg, but this time Komazawa came out on top as Suzuki made the final exchange of the day a second up on Ota.
But the biggest news was happening behind them. Back from injuries that kept him out of Izumo and Nationals, Tokyo Kokusai University's Hakone 2nd and 3rd leg CR holder Vincent Yegon wrapped his college ekiden career by becoming the first Kenyan to set three course records at Hakone. As Yegon went from 12th to 4th he clocked 1:00:00 on the uphill course, 30 seconds under the old CR and equivalent to a 1:00:34 half marathon. And with that, he cemented his place as one of Hakone's all-time greats.
The great equalizer at Hakone is its uphill 5th leg, 20.8 km that climbs to 874 m elevation before dropping back down sharply to finish on the shores of Lake Ashi. It's an icon of the sport, a place where major turnarounds can take place and where the overall win is often definitively settled. It almost never happens that the two favorite teams start it head-to-head, but with AGU's Kotaro Wakita only a second behind Komazawa's Takuma Yamakawa it was exactly that kind of rare day.
The 1st-year Yamakawa won his 11.8 km leg at Nationals in November and confidently started fast, putting 15 seconds on Wakita before the real climb even started past Hakone Yumoto Station. Chuo's Haruki Abe overtook Wakita to move into 2nd and steadily moved up on Yamakawa until he was 10 seconds back, but after the steepest uphill section 2/3 of the way into the stage he started to lose ground again. Once the downhill to the last section along Lake Ashi started Yamakawa's lead regrew quickly, and with that Komazawa's day one win was set.
Yamakawa brought Komazawa to the finish line in 5:23:10, the 4th-fastest time to date on the current version of the course even with the slow 1st leg. Abe faded to 30 seconds back, but Chuo's 5:23:40 was still good for 5th-best. Wakita finished another 1:33 behind to put AGU in 3rd, 2:03 behind Komazawa.
Izumo and Nationals runner-up Koku Gakuin University was 4th in 5:27:10, Waseda University, last year's overall Hakone runner-up Juntendo University and TKU all finishing with 39 seconds of them. Hosei University was another 1:04 behind in 5:28:53 for 8th, with Josai University taking 9th in 5:29:08 thanks to a 5th leg CR from Yuito Yamamoto. 2021 Hakone runner-up Soka University was seconds behind Josai in 10th, caught by Yamamoto right before the final turn to the finish line.
After falling to 19th after a 2nd leg disaster from former 5000 m H.S. NR holder Kosuke Ishida, Toyo University rallied to 11th in 5:30:42. The top 10 at the end of day two will earn guaranteed places at the 100th Hakone Ekiden a year from now, and you can imagine how much that will be worth both to the team and to universities' admissions and alumni fundraising programs. With 1:27 separating 10th-place Soka and 11th-place Toyo there's a clear divide right now, but not one that can't be crossed. 12th-place Meiji and 13th-place Tokai were both over 2 minutes behind Soka, harder to bridge but still in the range of the possible, especially with at least TKU likely to drop out of the top 10. It'll be some of the most exciting racing of day two tomorrow whatever happens.
Up front, Komazawa's chances for its first triple crown are looking good. It still has a sub-61 half marathoner, another sub-62 half marathoner, three sub-63 half marathoners and 5000 m U20 NR holder Keita Sato in reserved, more than enough for head coach Hiroaki Oyagi to work with. It's probably getting greedy to think about it, but if Komazawa not only won but pulled off the overall CR it would be only the 2nd team ever to break all three CR in one season, sort of a diamond triple crown. The slow 1st leg today probably put it out of reach, but what would that take? A 5:20:31 day two CR, 1:05 better than AGU's day two record last year. That's a big ask, but if the people Komazawa has lined up are at 100% it's doable.
Just 30 seconds behind, Chuo still has five sub-63 half marathoners, not quite on a par with Komazawa but not impossible. At 2:03 AGU has the same kind of deficit to make up as Meiji and Tokai, but at the winning level that's a lot harder than at the podium level. Head coach Susumu Hara knows what he's doing and has four sub-63 half marathoners and two sub-28:30 track 10000 m runners in waiting, so even with that kind of deficit you can't count AGU out. Definitely not an easy task ahead of them, but wilder comebacks have happened. At 4 minutes behind KGU is too far out to have a realistic shot at the win. Even matching its 2nd place finishes at the season's first two ekidens would be a stretch. 3rd place would be a successful return trip tomorrow.
Day Two runs from Lake Ashi back down the mountain and on to central Tokyo and the waiting crowds. NTV's live TV broadcast starts with a pre-race show at 7:00 a.m., with streaming on their Hakone site at 7:50, and domestic streaming of Day Two also on TVer. There’s no official international streaming, but get yourself a VPN or subscribe to one of the online services that makes it possible to watch Japanese TV and you’re in. JRN will be back at 7:00 a.m. to cover it all again on @JRNLive, so buy us a coffee and help make it possible. See you then for the last day of the best three days of racing of 2023.
99th Hakone Ekiden Day One
Tokyo-Kanagawa, 02 Jan. 2023
21 teams, 5 stages, 107.5 km
Top Individual Stage Performances
First Stage (21.3 km)
1. Shunpei Tomita (4th yr., Meiji Univ.) - 1:02:44
2. Kensuke Tsubura (4th yr., Komazawa Univ.) - 1:02:53
3. Hayate Nitta (4th yr., Ikuei Univ./Alliance) - 1:02:59
4. Rei Matsunaga (3rd yr., Hosei Univ.) - 1:03:00
5. Itta Tameike (1st yr., Chuo Univ.) - 1:03:02
Second Stage (23.1 km)
1. Yamato Yoshii (3rd yr., Chuo Univ.) - 1:06:22 - all-time #8
2. Kotaro Kondo (4th yr., Aoyama Gakuin Univ.) - 1:06:24 - all-time #10
3. Ren Tazawa (4th yr., Komazawa Univ.) - 1:06:34
4. Shotaro Ishikawa (3rd yr., Tokai Univ.) - 1:07:09
5. Boniface Mulwa (4th yr., Yamanashi Gakuin Univ.) - 1:07:22
Third Stage (21.4 km)
1. Shota Nakano (3rd yr., Chuo Univ.) - 1:01:51
2. Kotaro Shinohara (2nd yr., Komazawa Univ.) - 1:01:58
2. Ryuto Igawa (4th yr., Waseda Univ.) - 1:01:58
4. Shota Morishita (1st yr., Meiji Univ.) - 1:02:05
5. Ayumu Yamamoto (2nd yr., Koku Gakuin Univ.) - 1:02:07
Fourth Stage (20.9 km)
1. Vincent Yegon (4th yr., Tokyo Kokusai Univ.) - 1:00:00 - CR
2. Aoi Ota (2nd yr., Aoyama Gakuin Univ.) - 1:00:35 - all-time #3
3. Mebuki Suzuki (3rd yr., Komazawa Univ.) - 1:01:00 - all-time #5
4. Ryo Fujimoto (4th yr., Koku Gakuin Univ.) - 1:01:48 - all-time #10
5. Shunsuke Yoshii (1st yr., Chuo Univ.) - 1:01:49
Fifth Stage (20.8 km, >800 m climb)
1. Yuito Yamamoto (3rd yr., Josai Univ.) - 1:10:04 - CR
2. Shunsuke Shikama (4th yr., Juntendo Univ.) - 1:10:19 - all-time #2
3. Haruki Abe (2nd yr., Chuo Univ.) - 1:10:36 - all-time #5
4. Takuma Yamakawa (1st yr., Komazawa Univ.) - 1:10:45 - all-time #8
5. Yoshihiro Maeda (4th yr., Toyo Univ.) - 1:11:21
Team Results
1. Komazawa University - 5:23:10 - all-time #4
2. Chuo University - 5:23:40 - all-time #5
3. Aoyama Gakuin University - 5:25:13
4. Koku Gakuin University - 5:27:10
5. Waseda University - 5:27:33
6. Juntendo University - 5:27:41
7. Tokyo Kokusai University - 5:27:49
8. Hosei University - 5:28:53
9. Josai University - 5:29:08
10. Soka University - 5:29:15
11. Toyo University - 5:30:42
12. Meiji University - 5:31:29
13. Tokai University - 5:31:40
14. Teikyo University - 5:32:20
15. Kokushikan University - 5:33:16
16. Yamanashi Gakuin University - 5:33:39
17. Daito Bunka University - 5:36:01
18. Nittai University - 5:36:33
OP - Kanto Region Student Alliance - 5:36:52
19. Senshu University - 5:38:35
20. Rikkyo University - 5:38:51
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