We’re deep into championship ekiden season. During the last two weekends the six areas making up the company leagues held their qualifying races for the Jan. 1 New Yr Ekiden company males’s nationwide championships. The New Yr Ekiden is without doubt one of the solely national-level championship ekidens that does not give its podium finishers auto-qualifying spots for the subsequent yr, which means each staff has to run the regional races each November. It is not laborious to see how that eats into the autumn marathon season and the way doing it the identical approach they do for all the opposite huge ekidens, together with the company ladies’s nationwide championships later this month, and having the highest groups auto-qualify, would open up the autumn schedule and enhance Japan’s performances in males’s marathoning. However it’s what it’s proper now.
Rather than an auto-qualifying spot for podium finishers, the nationwide company federation redistributes the wealth of qualifying slots accessible in every area based mostly on how the groups in that area did on the New Yr Ekiden the yr earlier than. The East Japan Area the place Tokyo is situated was a massacre this yr in regional race on Nov. 3, with solely 10 slots accessible to not less than 17 groups with a practical likelihood of qualifying. GMO led begin to end off a 32:42 CR on the 11.6 km 1st leg by Yuya Yoshida and quickest instances on 4 of the 7 legs general. Sunbelx was a shock at third, its best-ever end result, Fujitsu touchdown 4th regardless of a 29:38 CR on the ten.6 km Sixth leg by Yuhei Urano. SID Group took tenth, edging out Konica Minolta by 1:19 for the final qualifying spot. Different non-qualifiers included Press Kogyo, Comodi Iida, ND Software program, Fujisan no Meisui, Komori Company and the Tokyo Metropolitan Police.
9 slots had been open within the Kyushu Area the identical day, and with solely 8 sturdy groups all any of them needed to do to qualify was mainly present up and end. The primary 5 of the race’s 7 legs had been thrilling and stuffed with turnover, with 3 completely different groups taking turns main and 5 occupying a spot within the high 3 in some unspecified time in the future. Ryo Saito of Asahi Kasei ran down Kurosaki Harima‘s Daisuke Doi on the fifth leg to place Asahi Kasei 1 second forward, and the final two levels could not have been extra dramatic. Asahi Kasei and Kurosaki Harima’s Sixth runners Kenta Murayama and Tomonobu Tamura each ran equivalent instances, handing off to anchors Akira Aizawa and Sota Fukutani with the identical 1-second margin. Aizawa introduced AK residence for the win with precisely the identical margin, 1 second. Behind AK’s B-team and two choose groups, Togami Denki picked up the ninth qualifying spot nearly 4 minutes behind eighth qualifier Nishitetsu.
Every week later the opposite 4 areas did their factor on Nov. 10. Within the mixed Chubu and Hokuriku Area race, Toyota Boshoku ran a course report 3:51:03 for 80.5 km, the quickest common tempo of any staff throughout the 6 qualifying races, to beat 2024 New Yr Ekiden champion Toyota by over a minute. That stated, Toyota’s power was break up with a B-team whose lead runner Tatsuya Maruyama outran the A-team’s Yusaku Nomura by 2 seconds. Perpetual Hokuriku winner YKK did it once more, however this time with an nearly 5-minute CR for the Hokuriku division that put it third general in opposition to probably the most a lot stronger Chubu Area groups.
Not a lot drama got here within the Chugoku Area race, which had 5 qualifying slots this yr for its 4 historically sturdy groups. Chudenko was 1st as ordinary in 4:00:18, over two minutes up on 2nd-placer Chugoku Denryoku. The a lot weaker Takeda Yakuhin staff lucked out with the additional spot accessible this time, taking a straightforward fifth nearly 13 minutes behind 4th-placer JFE Metal and over 13 minutes up on Sixth-place Hoshizaki.
Other than East Japan, the Kansai Area was the one one the place any legit staff actually had an opportunity of not qualifying, with 4 slots accessible to six groups adequate to make it. SG Holdings led wire to wire to win by 2 1/2 minutes, however 2nd by means of 4th-placers Otsuka Seiyaku, Osaka Fuel and Sumitomo Denko all completed shut collectively to select up the opposite qualifying spots. NTT Nishi Nihon was the shock non-qualifier, anchor Hazuma Hattori run down by Sumitomo Denko’s Kazuki Tamura after NTT had spent the 2nd by means of Sixth legs inside the highest 4 and as excessive as 2nd. The Osaka Police Division staff additionally didn’t qualify at Sixth.
69th New Yr Ekiden Entry Checklist
Company Males’s Nationwide Championship
Maebashi, Gunma, 1 Jan. 2025
instances listed are common tempo in regional qualifying race
