Osaka Geijutsu University performing arts major Hikaru Kitagawa kicked off the final day of the Chengdu World University Games with the first Japanese women's gold medal of the games in athletics, winning the half marathon in 1:13:17 by 14 seconds over Turkey's Yayla Kilic Gonen. And winning it in style. 3 seconds behind Kilic Gonen at 20 km, Kitagawa closed from there to the finish in 3:08, or 2:51/km pace, the kind of split you'd more often see in a men's race. You have to wonder if the 20 km split was accurate, but anyway Kitagawa made up 17 seconds in 1.0975 km, which is pretty good.
Fatma Karasu made it a Turkish 2-3 with a 1:14:28 for bronze. Rio Einaga of Osaka Gakuin University was 8th in 1:15:34 and national champion Meijo University's Saki Harada 14th in 1:16:36, enough to land Japan the team silver behind Turkey. China took the team bronze.
Japanese men usually dominate the World University Games half marathon given their focus on that distance for the Hakone Ekiden, especially with 1:00:11 half marathoner Kotaro Shinohara of 2023 Hakone ekiden champ Komazawa University at the helm. But for whatever reason this time, they came up empty-handed. Turkey's Sezgin Atac and Ayetullah Aslanhan went 1-2 in 1:04:36 and 1:04:37, China's Kegu Yang just back in bronze in 1:04:48. And again, the closing splits. Atac 2:50 from 20 km to the finish, 2:35/km pace. Aslanhan 1 second slower. Yang 2:48 over the last section, 2:33/km. Shinohara 3:08, the same as Kitagawa. It's hard to believe the 20 km mark could have been right, but splits further down the field in both races seemed realistic.
At any rate, Chuo Gakuin University's Reishi Yoshida finished 12 seconds out of the medal in 4th in 1:05:00. Shinohara was 6th in 1:05:39, with Hosei University's Rei Matsunaga 12th in 1:06:39. That gave the Japanese men the consolation prize of a team bronze behind Turkey and China, but the lack of an individual medal had to have hurt their pride.
Shinohara's Komazawa teammate Taiyo Yasuhara delivered Japan's last medal of the Games in the men's 5000 m final. In a tight pack race to the finish France's Simon Bedard just clipped Yasuhara at the line for gold in 14:14.10, Yasuhara taking silver in 14:14.15. Kyrgyzstan's Nursultan Keneshbekov took bronze in 14:15.33, just holding off Tokai University's top man Shotaro Ishihara, 4th in 14:16.43.
In other finals, the Japanese women's 4x100 m was 4th in a best of 44.66, missing bronze medalists South Africa by 0.30 seconds. The Japanese men ran a best of 38.92 but only finished 5th, 0.09 behind South Africa in bronze and 0.12 off gold medalists China and surprise silver medalist Thailand. Rin Suzuki of Kyushu Kyoritsu University and Yusaku Iwao of Tsukuba University placed 4th and 5th in the men's javelin throw, Suzuki throwing a PB of 78.41 m on his final attempt but coming 1 cm short of bronze medalist Topias Paine of Finland. Yuto Toriumi of Nihon University was 5th in the men's long jump final with a 7.74 m -0.8 m/s SB on his 2nd attempt. Tsukuba's Saki Katagihara was another 5th in the women's 1500 m final, running 4:18.57.
All told, Japan's medal count at the Chengdu World University Games came to 2 gold medals, 4 silvers and 5 bronzes despite a relatively small team roster.Complete day 6 results are available here.
© 2023 Brett Larner, all rights reserved
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