Japan’s 43rd National Junior Olympic Cup this fall was held at the prefectural level due to the coronavirus pandemic.
Usually held in one central location in a traditional format, the JOC hosts junior high school and high school swimmers across 47 Japanese prefectures. However, with social distancing and other coronavirus-related restrictions in place, the JASF held the 2020 competition over a series of weeks, with each prefecture hosting its own edition of the competition.
Now that all competitions have been conducted, times performed across the 47 prefectures have been ranked virtually. You can view the entire rakings document, in Japanese, here.
Of note, the JASF has announced this week that the same virtual format will be in place for the Junior Olympic Cup Spring Tournament as well. The one-location event originally slated for March will now be held once again at the prefectural level.
The JASF said of its decision, “In order to maintain the goals of the next generation of swimmers (elementary school to high school students), we aim to allow all qualifiers to race in this tournament without reducing the scale.”
Japan is the host of the 2020 Olympic Games which have been delayed to July 2021 due to the coronavirus pandemic. At the time of publishing, Japan has seen 110,000 reported coronavirus cases (.087% of the population) resulting in 1840 deaths.