Koji Murofushi, the Beijing Olympic bronze medallist at the Hammer Throw, was selected as the 2008 JPN AOY by a panel of forty-eight track and field experts who were asked to list the name of top ten athletes of the year.
Murofushi finished ahead of Nobuharu Asahara, who anchored the bronze medal winning 4x100m relay team at the Beijing Olympic Games. Actually, Asahara, who retired after the 2008 Super Meet in September, collected more first place votes than Murofushi. However, while all experts selected Murofushi in their top five choice, only forty-one out of forty-eight experts gave their top ten vote to Asahara, and thus at the end, Murofushi came out on the top.
In 2008 Murofushi was third at both the Olympic Games and the World Athletics Final. For Murofushi, it was his third AOY award, having voted to the distinction in 2001, when he won a silver medal at World Championships in Edmonton, and in 2004, when he won the gold medal in the Athens Olympic Games. He is the only three times winner in the history of the award, which started in 1986.
Yuki Yamazaki, who finished seventh at 50Km Walk in the Beijing Olympics and recorded the fourth fastest time of the season, was third, having won three first place votes. They were followed by Naoki Tsukahara, a sprinter, Satomi Kubokura, a 400m hurdler, Chisato Fukushima, another sprinter, Mayumi Kawasaki, a walker, and Asami Tanno, a long sprinter.
Because Japanese distance runners did not fare too well in the 2008 season only two distance runners – Kayoko Fukushi and Yuriko Kobayashi – made the top ten list. However, the next four slots (eleven to fourteenth place) were occupied by up and coming distance runners – Yurika Nakamura, Yukiko Akaba, Yoshimi Ozaki and Kensuke Takezawa; they may make an impact in the upcoming season.
The results were tallied by Track and Field Magazine of Japan (Rikujyo Kyogi Magazine) by allocating first place ten points, second place nine points etc. down to one point for tenth place, and announced in the February issue of the magazine.
Ken Nakamura for the IAAF
1) Koji Murofushi
2) Nobuharu Asahara
3) Yuki Yamazaki
4) Naoki Tsukahara
5) Satomi Kubokura
6) Chisato Fukushima
7) Mayumi Kawasaki
8) Asami Tanno
9) Kayoko Fukushi
10) Yuriko Kobayashi
