Kitaguchi Wins Japan's First-Ever Non-Marathon World Championships Women's Gold - Day 7 Japanese Results
Haruka Kitaguchi lived up to her #1 in the world ranking with a last-second comeback to take gold on the 7th day of the Budapest World Championships. Stunningly consistent with her first five throws all between 61.78 m and 63.00 m, Kitaguchi sat in 4th place just out of the medals when she stepped up for her 6th and final attempt. Australian Mackenzie Little and Latvian Anete Kocina were just ahead at 63.38 m and 63.18 m, but with Colombia's Flor Denis Ruiz Hurtado having opened with a 65.47 m area record it would take something special for Kitaguchi to move into the top spot.
And that's exactly what she delivered. Kitaguchi threw 66.73 m, the second-furthest of her career and just 31 cm off her month-old national record, right when it mattered. With that she stepped into the history books as the first Japanese woman ever to win a World Championships gold medal in an event other than the marathon. Back home there were immediate calls for a national holiday to be declared. Not bad for a former swimmer.
No such luck, though, for the Japanese men in the javelin throw, as both Roderick Dean and Kenji Ogura failed to make the final, Dean missing by 57 cm at 79.21 m for 14th in the qualifying round and Ogura well off at 76.65 m for 22nd.
The men's 4x100 m team did deliver on the prospect of another medal, though. The mostly young team of Ryuichiro Sakai, Hiroki Yanagita, Yuki Koike and Abdul Hakim Sani Brown ran the 4th-fastest time ever by a Japanese men's 4x100 m, 37.71, to take 3rd in its heat behind the U.S.A. and Jamaica with all three finishing within 0.04. And that was with a slightly shaky exchange between Sakai and Yanagita. Italy and South Africa were in the same range too in Heat 2, Italy at 37.65 and South Africa at 37.72, promising a tight and unpredictable final tomorrow night.
Also set to wrap tomorrow, Yuma Maruyama represented Japan in the decathlon. Through the first day he sat in 17th of 18 athletes to complete the first five events, scoring 3936 points with his best individual event the 400 m at 780 points for 17th.
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