Skip to main content

Toyokawa Boys Win National High School Ekiden Debut in All-Time #4 2:02:55

by Brett Larner

Toyokawa H.S. wins the 2012 National High School Boys Ekiden title in 2:02:55, the all-time #4 time. Click photo for video highlights courtesy of broadcaster NHK.

#1-ranked Toyokawa H.S. blew apart the 2012 National High School Boys Ekiden Championships in its national debut, taking the lead on the third stage and never looking back.  With Third Stage runner Jeremiah Karemi missing the great Samuel Wanjiru's stage record of 22:40 by just 7 seconds and star members of Wanjiru's alma mater Sendai Ikuei H.S. having transferred to Toyokawa in the spring the team took the national title in 2:02:55, the fourth-fastest time in Nationals history and the first time in 50 years that a school won in its first appearance.  #2 seed Nishiwaki Kogyo H.S. presented no challenge, down by more than two minutes before rallying for 2nd in a quality 2:04:46.  #4-ranked Iga Hakuho H.S. anchor Takumi Kawato ran down defending champion Sera H.S. on the anchor stage before winning out in a thrilling sprint finish against Kurashiki H.S. anchor Kosei Nagahama for 3rd.

With their head coach Hideji Machino having passed away over the summer and the team dedicating its race to his memory Iga Hakuho's Yusuke Nishiyama provided one of the highlights of the day on the race's most competitive stage, the 10.0 km First Stage.  In a tense series of turnovers between most of the country's best high school runners, Nishiyama went head-to-head with Toyokawa's sub-14 ace Hazuma Hattori in the final 500 m.  Surprisingly, it was Nishiyama who pulled ahead to win the stage by one second in 29:38.  Second Stage runner Shunya Kuroyanagi was even more surprising, opening another 7 seconds on Toyokawa, but on the third stage despite a solid performance there was nothing Iga Hakuho's Masatoshi Sakata could do to hold off Karemi or Sera's John Gathaiya and the team fell to 3rd.

Karemi started strong and at halfway through the 8.1075 km stage was 10 seconds off Wanjiru's record.    Where Sera grads Charles Ndirangu and Bitan Karoki had missed Wanjiru's record by 1 and 8 seconds after starting fast and fading, Karemi continued to push harder through the hilly second half, outdoing Wanjiru's second half split by 3 seconds.  In a post-race interview he said in Japanese that he hadn't felt right when he started and couldn't run 100% for the first two kilometers, regretting that he had missed the record by 7 seconds as a result but confident that he had done what he needed to do for Toyokawa to take the win.

Toyokawa's Tadashi Isshiki, one of its Sendai Ikuei transferees, opened the 8.0875 km Fourth Stage with a 2:35 km before calming down, running a stage best to remove any doubt of the team's win.  Behind him Nishiwaki Kogyo took over the second position where it remained for the rest of the race.  Four different teams occupied 3rd over the turbulent and exciting final four stages before Iga Hakuho claimed the position, anchor Kawato smiling in triumph after winning the sprint finish against Kurashiki's Nagahama and the honoring of his coach's memory.  Defending champion Sera was 5th, while Hakuoh Prep Ashikaga H.S. came on strong late in the race to finish 6th, its first time ever making the podium.  Unheralded Kobayashi H.S. and Yamanashi Gakuin Prep H.S. came on late in the race to round out the eight-deep podium as Oita Tomei H.S., looking like a lock for 8th with a kilometer to go, fell to 11th.

Like the girls' race, overall it was a fast and deep edition of Nationals with seven teams breaking 2:06 and fourteen under 2:07.  To give an idea what that means in terms of the quality of these high school teams, winner Toyokawa's average 7-man 5000 m best is 14:11.43 and runner-up Nishiwaki Kogyo's is 14:12.54. NCAA DI XC 3rd-place University of Colorado's 7-man average is 14:12.56. All of the top ten-placing high schools except Kobayashi and 9th-place Tosu Kogyo H.S. have faster 7-man averages than NCAA 4th-place Northern Arizona University.  The best individuals will next meet up on their home prefectures' teams at the Jan. 20 National Men's Ekiden, always the place where graduating seniors make their biggest statements before heading on to college and Hakone.

2012 National High School Boys Ekiden Championships
Kyoto, 12/23/12
47 teams, 7 stages, 42.195 km
click here for complete results

Stage Best Performances
First Stage (10.0 km) - Yusuke Nishiyama (Iga Hakuho H.S.) - 29:38
Second Stage (3.0 km) - Hideaki Ishii (Fujisawa Shoyo H.S.) - 8:17
Third Stage (8.1075 km) - Jeremiah Karemi (Kenya/Toyokawa H.S.) - 22:47
Fourth Stage (8.0875 km) - Tadashi Isshiki (Toyokawa H.S.) - 23:21
Fifth Stage (3.0 km) - Taisuke Hirose (Iga Hakuho H.S.) - 8:38
Sixth Stage (5.0 km) - Kenta Yaguchi (Hakuoh Prep Ashikaga H.S.) - 14:52
Seventh Stage 5.0 km) - Rei Nishiyama (Yamanashi Gakuin Prep H.S.) - 14:29

 Top Teams
1. Toyokawa H.S. (Aichi) - 2:02:55
2. Nishiwaki Kogyo H.S. (Hyogo) - 2:04:46
3. Iga Hakuho H.S. (Mie) - 2:05:33
4. Kurashiki H.S. (Okayama) - 2:05:33
5. Sera H.S. (Hiroshima) - 2:05:53
6. Hakuoh Prep Ashikaga H.S. (Tochigi) - 2:05:54
7. Kobayashi H.S. (Miyazaki) - 2:05:54
8. Yamanashi Gakuin Prep H.S. (Yamanashi) - 2:06:07
9. Tosu Kogyo H.S. (Saga) - 2:06:22
10. Saku Chosei H.S. (Nagano) - 2:06:24

(c) 2012 Brett Larner
all rights reserved
Labels:

Comments

Brett Larner said…
Thanks to Bruce Carrick for pointing out the quality of Japanese H.S. teams relative to NCAA university teams back in January.
December 24, 2012 at 8:55 AM
Post a Comment

Most-Read This Week

Morii Surprises With Second-Ever Japanese Sub-2:10 at Boston

With three sub-2:09 Japanese men in the race and good weather conditions by Boston standards the chances were decent that somebody was going to follow 1981 winner Toshihiko Seko 's 2:09:26 and score a sub-2:10 at the Boston Marathon . But nobody thought it was going to be by a 2:14 amateur. Paris Olympic team member Suguru Osako had taken 3rd in Boston in 2:10:28 in his debut seven years ago, and both he and 2:08 runners Kento Otsu and Ryoma Takeuchi were aiming for spots in the top 10, Otsu after having run a 1:01:43 half marathon PB in February and Takeuchi of a 2:08:40 marathon PB at Hofu last December. A high-level amateur with a 2:14:15 PB who scored a trip to Boston after winning a local race in Japan, Yuma Morii told JRN minutes before the start of the race, "I'm not thinking about time at all. I'm going to make top 10, whatever time it takes." Running Boston for the first time Morii took off with a 4:32 on the downhill opening mile, but after that  Sis
Post a Comment
Read more

The Ivy League at the Izumo Ekiden in Review

Last week I was contacted by Will Geiken , who I'd met years ago when he was a part of the Ivy League Select Team at the Izumo Ekiden . He was looking for historical results from Izumo and lists of past team members, and I was able to put together a pretty much complete history, only missing the alternates from 1998 to 2010 and a little shaky on the reverse transliterations of some of the names from katakana back into the Western alphabet for the same years. Feel free to send corrections or additions to alternate lists. It's interesting to go back and see some names that went on to be familiar, to see the people who made an impact like Princeton's Paul Morrison , Cornell's Max King , Stanford's Brendan Gregg in one of the years the team opened up beyond the Ivy League, Cornell's Ben de Haan , Princeton's Matt McDonald , and Harvard's Hugo Milner last year, and some of the people who struggled with the format. 1998 Team: 15th of 21 overall, 2:14:10 (43
Post a Comment
Read more

Hirabayashi Runs PB at Shanghai Half, WR Holder Nakata Dominates Fuji Five Lakes - Weekend Road Roundup

Returning to the roads after his 2:06:18 win at February's Osaka Marathon, Kiyoto Hirabayashi (Koku Gakuin University) took 5th at Sunday's Shanghai Half Marathon in a PB 1:01:23, just under a minute behind winner Roncer Kipkorir Konga (Kenya) who clocked a CR 1:00:29. After inexplicably running the equivalent of a sub-59 half marathon to win the Hakone Ekiden's Third Stage, Aoi Ota (Aoyama Gakuin Univ.) was back to running performances consistent with his other PBs with a 1:02:30 for 8th. His AGU teammate Kyosuke Hiramatsu was 10th in 1:04:00. Women's winner Magdalena Shauri (Tanzania) also set a new CR in 1:09:57. Aoyama Gakuin runners took the top four spots in the men's half marathon at the Aomori Sakura Marathon , with Hakone alternate Kosei Shiraishi getting the win in 1:04:32 and B-team members Shunto Hamakawa and Kei Kitamura 2nd and 3rd in 1:04:45 and 1:04:48. Club runners took the other division titles, Hina Shinozaki winning the women's half
Post a Comment
Read more