HIROSHIMA, Japan — Sorato Shimizu, a 16-year-old sprinter from Ishikawa Prefecture, delivered a performance for the history books on Saturday, running 10.00 seconds in the 100 meters at Japan’s Inter High School Championships.
He now stands as the joint-fifth fastest Japanese sprinter of all time — regardless of age.
A student at Seiryo High School, Shimizu crossed the line with a legal tailwind of +1.7 meters per second, rewriting both the world age-group record and Japan’s national high school record of 10.01 set by Yoshihide Kiryu in 2013.
Shimizu’s run signals the arrival of a new force in Japanese sprinting — and perhaps the dawn of an international career already racing ahead of schedule.
