2023 JAPANESE SHORT COURSE CHAMPIONSHIPS
- Saturday, October 21st & Sunday, October 22nd
- Tokyo Aquatics Center
- SCM (25m)
- Entries (in Japanese)
The 65th Japanese Short Course Championships are set to take place on Saturday, October 21st and Sunday, October 22nd in Tokyo.
Although the likes of Ryosuke Irie, Shoma Sato and Naoki Mizunuma are currently competing across the World Aquatics Swimming World Cup, this domestic competition still carries some heavy-hitters ready to make some noise.
Among them is 2022 Junior Pan Pacific champion Airi Mitsui. 19-year-old Mitsui is entered in her signature 200m butterfly, the event in which she placed 5th at this year’s long course World Championships.
Newly-minted Asian Games champion in the 100m fly, Katsuhiro Matsumoto is also among the competitors bound for Tokyo, as is former World Record holder Ippei Watanabe.
Finally, two-time Olympic champion Yui Ohashi is entered in both the 200m and 400m IM events.
It was at this meet last year that Olympic silver medalist Tomoru Honda ripped a historic World Record in the men’s 200m fly. Honda hit a time of 1:46.85 to knock well over a second off of teammate Seto’s previous WR of 1:48.24. Unfortunately for Honda fans, however, the 21-year-old is not entered in this year’s championships.
Reona Aoki also put up an impressive performance at the 2022 edition of this competition. She logged a lifetime best of 1:04.01 to establish a new national record in the 100m breast.
One year later, however, and Japan is coming off disappointing finishes both in Fukuoka as well as at this year’s Asian Games in Hangzhou. In the latter, the nation fell from topping the overall swimming medal table at the last edition in 2018 to placing 3rd this time around. China and Korea were #1 and #2 in the medal table at the 2023 edition.
One highlight for Japan at the Asian Games came in the form of 23-year-old Rikako Ikee making her first major international competitive podium in 5 years. The leukemia survivor captured bronze in the women’s 50m fly, although she is absent from these Short Course Championships entries.
Key Men’s Entrants
Kosuke Matsui
Shinri Shioura
Juran Mizohata
Katsumi Nakamura
Masahiro Kawane
Katsuhiro Matsumoto
Yoshida Keisuke
Junya Koga
Ippei Watanabe
Shinnosuke Ishikawa
Takeshi Kawamoto
Daiya Seto
Key Women’s Entrants
Ai Soma
Rio Shirai
Anna Konishi
Reona Aoki
Satomi Suzuki
Airi Mitsui
Mio Narita
Yui Ohashi
