Sou Ogata Hits Sub-2:00 200 IM At Japan Inter-High School C’ships

89th Japan Inter-High School Swimming Championships

• Tuesday, August 17th – Friday, August 20th
• Nagano Athletic Park
• LCM (50m)
• Results (in Japanese)

The Japan Inter-High School Swimming Championships are taking place for the first time in two years, as last year’s annual event was cancelled due to the coronavirus pandemic.

This time around the 89th edition is being held at Nagano Athletic Park, with nearly 790 swimmers set to dive in representing 47 prefectures in all.

Taking the women’s 400m freestyle right off the bat was Rika Okamura of Hachioji High School. The 2nd year student punched a time of 4:14.25 to get her hand on the wall first in a new lifetime best.

The men’s edition saw Hiroyoshi Miyaki strike gold, producing a winning result of 3:52.43. That sliced nearly 2 seconds off of the 3:54.32 personal best he entered this meet with, a time he logged at the Japan Open in June.

While Riko Sawano took the women’s 200m IM in a time of 2:14.65, the men’s race saw 17-year-old Sou Ogata hit the only sub-2:00 time of the field in 1:59.81. Ogata’s time fell just .07 outside of his own lifetime best of 1:59.74, a time he put up at the Japan Championships in February.

Additional winners on day 1 here in Nagano included Yuri Matsumoto taking the 200m breast in 2:27.36 while Hamade Sakuya topped the men’s field in 2:12.71.

In the 50m free, Chisakura Oshima was too quick for the rest of the competition, touching in 25.74 for gold while Ryodai Yamaguchi posted 23.10 for the top spot of the men’s final.