Skip to main content

Saitama Wins Final East Japan Women's Ekiden With Dramatic Anchor Stage Turnaround by Yamanouchi


The final edition of the East Japan Women's Ekiden was held Nov. 10 in Fukushima, with teams of 9 athletes ranging from junior high school students to corporate leaguers representing the 18 prefectures in eastern and northern Japan competing over 42.195 km. For the first time in 18 years Saitama took the win, running 2:19:07 to score its fourth title in the event's 39-year history despite not taking a single individual stage title. Gunma was 2nd, with Tokyo placing 3rd.

Saitama's lead runner Wakana Fukuyama, a 2nd-year at Saitama Sakae H.S., started them off in 8th after the 6.0 km 1st leg. Over the next three legs Saitama moved up as high as 3rd, fluctuating a few spots over the stages of that but advancing to 2nd thanks to a great run from Tamai J.H.S. 3rd- year Momoka Ono on the second-to-last stage. That put Saitama's anchor Minami Yamanouchi from the Shimamura corporate team 30 seconds back from the leader, and with 10.0 km to work with and a strong run she was able to close it down and take the win.

39th East Japan Women's Ekiden

Fukushima, 10 Nov. 2024
18 teams, 9 stages, 42.195 km

Top Individual Stage Performances
First Stage (6.0 km) - Ayami Yoshida (Hokkaido) - 19:01
Second Stage (4.0 km) - Nami Kawakami (Nagano) - 12:52
Third Stage (3.0 km) - Yui Onotora (Miyagi) - 9:49
Fourth Stage (3.0 km) - Koko Fujisawa (Gunma) - 9:26
Fifth Stage (5.0875 km) - Aoi Hosokawa (Miyagi) - 16:33
Sixth Stage (4.1075 km) - Rena Imai (Nagano) - 12:51
Seventh Stage (4.0 km) - Koto Watanabe (Miyagi) - 13:09
Eighth Stage (3.0 km ) - Yuna Baba (Shizuoka) - 9:34
Ninth Stage (10.0 km ) - Kana Kobayashi (Gunma) - 31:55

Team Results
1. Saitama - 2:19:07
2. Gunma - 2:19:35
3. Tokyo - 2:19:52
4. Nagano - 2:19:58
5. Shizuoka - 2:20:11
6. Miyagi - 2:20:25
7. Fukushima - 2:20:37
8. Hokkaido - 2:22:03
9. Niigata - 2:22:12
10. Chiba - 2:22:38
11. Yamanashi - 2:22:46
12. Iwate - 2:23:18
13. Tochigi - 2:23:30
14. Ibaraki - 2:23:48
15. Kanagawa - 2:24:44
16. Akita - 2:25:51
17. Yamagata - 2:26:31
18. Aomori - 2:28:00


Comments

Most-Read This Week

Osako Breaks Marathon NR for 3rd Time - Weekend Roundup

It looked like it was going to be a big weekend, and it delivered. For the 3rd time in his career Suguru Osako broke the men's marathon NR, running 1 second under the standing record to take 4th in the Valencia Marathon in 2:04:55. All the way to 40 km he was steady on 2:58/km, 2:05:10 pace, and like a surprising number of other people in both the men's and women's races, there was a massive jump over the last 2.195 km from his projected finish time to his actual one. His run put Osako back on top of the Japanese charts, put the average of Japan's 10 fastest marathon times of the year under 2:06 for the first time, and got him into the L.A. Olympics marathon trials. Valencia has been trying to get top-tier Japanese athletes to come for years, and now that they finally managed to do it it paid off in a big way. Expect more next year. Back home, former Takushoku University captain Derese Workneh won a 3-way race against Toyota teammates Kazuya Nishiyama and Bedan Ka...

'Kobe 2024: Aitchison, Athmani Lead Record-Breaking Thursday'

  https://www.paralympic.org/news/kobe-2024-para-athletics-world-championships-aitchison-athmani-lead-record-breaking-thursday Complete results and daily schedule from the Kobe World Para Athletics Championships are here .

Summary of Japanese Medalists at Asian Athletics Championships

Overall:    gold: 4   silver: 6   bronze: 10 Men:    gold: 1   silver: 3   bronze: 4 Women:    gold: 3   silver: 3   bronze: 6 20th Asian Athletics Championships Pune, India, July 3-7, 2013 click here for complete results Men's 200 m Final   +0.7 m/s 1. Xie Zhenye (China) - 20.87 2. Fahad Mohammed Alsubaie (Saudi Arabia) - 20.912 3. Kei Takase (Japan) - 20.918 Men's 400 m Final 1. Yousef Ahmed Masrahi (Saudi Arabia) - 45.08 2. Ali Khamis (Bahrain) - 45.65 3. Yuzo Kanemaru (Japan) - 45.95 Men's 110 m Hurdles Final   +0.1 m/s 1. Jiang Fan (China) - 13.61 2. Abdulaziz Almandeel (Kuwait) - 13.78 3. Wataru Yazawa (Japan) - 13.88 Men's 400 m Hurdles Final 1. Yasuhiro Fueki (Japan) - 49.86 2. Cheng Wen (China) - 50.07 3. Satinder Singh (India) - 50.35 Men's 3000 m SC 1. Tarek Mubarak Taher (Bahrain) - 8:34.77 2. Dejene Regassa Mootoma (Bahrain) - 8:37.40 3. Tsuyoshi Takeda (Japan) - 8...