Hosts Kyoto maintain the report for many wins with 18 nationwide titles, they usually’re anticipated to face robust competitors from Osaka, Nagano, Kanagawa and Chiba. 2nd the final two years, this time round Kyoto’s lineup options two members of Ritsumeikan College, the winner at this season’s Morinomiyako Ekiden and Mt. Fuji Ladies’s Ekiden. Yumi Yamamoto ran in final yr’s U20 World Championships and set a brand new CR on her leg on the Mt. Fuji Ladies’s Ekiden, and she or he, teammate Tomo Muramatsu, and Kaede Kawamura, winner of December’s Sanyo Girls Highway Race 10 km, give Kyoto’s possibilities an enormous increase.
2023 winner Osaka has World Championships marathoner Madoka Nakano, Nationwide Excessive College Ekiden stage winner Kana Mizumoto, and Yua Tsukamoto from 2024 Nationwide Excessive College Ekiden Third-placer Osaka Kunei Joshi Gakuin H.S.
Nagano depends closely on athletes from 2024 Nationwide Excessive College Ekiden winner Nagano Higashi H.S. and is trying to rating its first win. Dominating on the First and Third Phases in Nagano Higashi’s nationwide title, Airi Mashiba and Mai Kubota paved the way.
Going for its first nationwide title in 12 years, Kanagawa options company leaguers Sora Shinozakura, fifth within the 5000 m finally yr’s Nationwide Observe and Area Championships, and Manami Nishiyama, winner of the 3000 m SC at September’s Nationwide Company Observe and Area Championships.
4th final yr, Chiba brings again final yr’s Fifth Stage CR breaker Risa Yamazaki from Nittai College and Erika Tanoura, winner of the First Stage at November’s Nationwide Company Ladies’s Ekiden. A win could be Chiba’s first since 1994.
Different notable athletes embody:
- 1500 m and 5000 m nationwide report holder Nozomi Tanaka working her tenth Nationwide Ladies’s Ekiden for Hyogo as her house prefecture marks the thirtieth anniversary of the Hanshin-Awaji earthquake.
- Paris Olympian Rino Goshima working for Ishikawa. Goshima gained the First Stage final yr simply after Ishikawa suffered critical harm from the Noto Peninsula earthquake, and her run then impressed everybody again house.
- Tokyo Olympics 5000 m and 10000 m runner Ririka Hironaka, representing her house of Nagasaki.
- Nationwide Junior Excessive College Championships 800 m winner Mayu Ishihara for Okayama.
- Nationwide Junior Excessive College Championships 1500 m winner Kana Inoue for Yamagata.
The Nationwide Ladies’s Ekiden course is 42.195 km lengthy divided into 9 levels. Options of every stage:
- First Stage (6.0 km): Beginning at Takebishi Stadium Kyoto and heading north on Nishioji Avenue, the First Stage’s strategic level comes late with a climb to the primary trade.
- Second Stage (4.0 km): Options many corners. On the 2009 version Beijing Olympian Yuriko Kobayashi handed 29 folks to set the still-standing course report for the Second Stage.
- Third Stage (3.0 km): Passing the Kyoto Imperial Palace, that is the primary of two levels reserved for junior highschool college students.
- Fourth Stage (4.0 km): This stage goes by Ginkakuji temple, and just like the opening leg its climb late within the stage has a big effect on the stream of the race.
- Fifth Stage (4.1075 km): The turnaround level within the race, close to the Kyoto Worldwide Convention Heart.
- Sixth Stage (4.0875km): After the turnaround level this stage heads south on Shirakawa Avenue. A crucial stage for organising the final remaining runners.
- Seventh Stage (4.0 km): Takes the runners throughout the Kamo River.
- Eighth Stage (3.0 km): The second of the 2 levels for junior highschool athletes.
- Ninth Stage (10.0 km): The anchor stage is the longest of the race. With a downhill beginning halfway via the stage, it finishes again at Takebishi Stadium.
supply article:
translated and edited by Brett Larner
