5th place finish at the 2024 Izumo Ekiden!

The Ivy Select team ran to its best finish ever at the Izumo Ekiden and finished 5th overall in a time of 2:12:18 for the 45.1km race. The historically strong team ran up front from the gun and delivered on their potential. Read more about the race below.

Race Recap

On Monday morning, October 14th, 2024, the Ivy League select team woke up at the New WelCity hotel in Izumo, Shimane ready to compete.  At 1:05pm local time, the 45.1-kilometer Izumo Ekiden began with a roar.

Leading off for the Ivy League, Kieran Tuntivate of Harvard got off the line hard, taking the lead within the first 100 meters and trailing close behind the lead motorbike.  At this early point in the race, I’m sure many in the dense crowd of spectators thought it would be unlikely the Ivy League would remain competitive for much of the race. Kieran held strong and kept the pace honest, with a big push around 6k to split open the field.  Two Japanese competitors, one from Aoyama Gakuin University (AGU) and the other Koku Gakuin University (KGU), both two of the top ranked teams coming into the race, not only covered Kieran’s move, but upped the ante, surging with less than 1k to go.  As the runners from AGU and KGU each balled their tasuki in a fist, Kieran inserted himself into second position and held on through the handoff to fellow Harvard teammate and 2023 British Champion, Will Battershill.

Though the second runner to receive the tasuki, Will was immediately passed by KGU’s second stage runner, whose mission was clearly to close the gap between first and third. Will kept his calm and let the KGU runner go. For the next ten minutes, Will was seen lurking in the background of the television broadcast, whose view was focused on the top two runners trading the lead. As the KGU runner began to fade in the latter third of the stage, Will closed the gap and without hesitation moved comfortably into second place. Will maintained his position and handed off to Columbia alumnus Tyler Berg. Matching Kieran’s performance, Will finished the day as the second fastest runner in his stage.

Though running in a favorable second place, Tyler found himself in a challenging position with the first place team starting 14 seconds ahead of him and teams three through eight being hot on his tail just 6 to 19 seconds back.  Tyler ran an incredibly strong leg, posting the fastest third stage time of any Ivy League runner by more than a minute. Critical for his teammates, Tyler kept the Ivy League in a 6th place position and handed off to Harvard’s Acer Iverson with fifth place well within striking distance.

Though he didn’t get nearly as much video time as Kieran, one of the top performances from the Ivy League team on the day was Acer Iverson’s fourth stage effort.  Having started his leg in sixth place, Acer powered his way through the 6.2-kilometer stage with a time of 17:46 with a 5k split of 14:15.  For those watching the live broadcast, it was clear that Acer was devouring concrete over the last kilometer at a faster rate than any of his competitors.  Acer’s time was the 2nd fastest of any runner on that stage and only four seconds behind KGU’s first place runner.

Acer handed off to fellow Crimson teammate and Izumo Ekiden veteran Matthew Pereira.  Matthew ran a strong fifth leg, maintaining the Ivy League’s spot among the top six finishers and setting the stage for the team’s first ever podium finish. The later stages of the Ekiden are some of the most challenging, not necessarily due to the terrain or their distance, but largely because the distance between competitors is often wide and the crowds are at their thinnest. Relying on his experience from 2023, Matthew ran a smart race and set the table for Ivy League rival-turned-teammate Rob Miranda of Yale.

When Rob received the tasuki from Matthew, the Ivy League team was in sixth place and 12 seconds back from fifth.  Rob’s mission was clear, at worst, do whatever it takes to hold on to a sixth place finish.  However, with one team clearly within striking distance, sixth place would never be good enough.  With his eyes up and staring ahead, the target was Josai University. With many teams placing their fastest runner as anchor, Rob’s 30 minute 20 second performance over 10.2 kilometers was exceptional and placed him as the seventh fastest anchor on the day.

Crossing the line in a total time of 2 hours 12 minutes and 18 seconds, Rob managed to catch the Josai University runner who faded to seventh, hold off a fast approaching Waseda University runner in sixth, and place the Ivy League Ekiden team to its highest ever finish in fifth.  During the award ceremony in the Izumo Dome, the Ivy League team stood proud knowing they were the first team to have reached that level of accomplishment in the 30+ years that the Ivy League had been invited to compete against some of the best in Japan.

To round out the day, the Ivy League team showcased their depth with Harvard alumnus Ka’eo Kruse time trialing a 5000 meter run on the track as night fell upon Izumo.  Paced by his teammates, Kae’o finished in 14 minutes 23 seconds before jumping on the bus and heading to the afterparty to celebrate!

Izumo, Shimane Prefecture, Monday October 14th, 2024

Ivy League Select Team - 2:12:18: 5th place.

First Stage - 8.0km

Kieran Tuntivate (Harvard) - 23:48: 2nd fastest runner.

Second Stage - 5.8 km

Will Battershill (Harvard) - 16:18: 2nd fastest runner.

Third Stage - 8.5 km

Tyler Berg (Columbia) - 24:59: 8th fastest runner.

Fourth Stage - 6.2 km

Acer Iverson (Harvard) - 17:46: 2nd fastest runner.

Fifth Stage - 6.4 km

Matthew Pereira (Harvard) - 19:07: 9th fastest runner.

Sixth Stage - 10.2 km

Robert Miranda (Yale) 30:20: 7th fastest runner.

The team also made a video documenting their time in Japan.

Words on the race from Jack Fultz (Team Manager since 1996):

It was long overdue that our Ivy League Select Ekiden relay team run a race commensurate with each of our six runners’ respective abilities. Try as we did each of the previous twenty-three years we’ve raced in Izumo, challenging circumstances appeared to prevent us from racing to our potential. We were always a stronger team on paper than in the race.

Those circumstance included:

• A 10 – 13-hour time change under which we race.

• Ekiden-style road relay racing is truly a “foreign racing format” to our athletes.

• October is typically a seasonal training lull for our athletes – they’re typically not race-ready.

• Our Japanese opponents are highly motivated as Izumo Ekiden is a national championship.

Despite the solid leg or two we achieved each year, we’ve never posted solid legs from all six of our runners – until this year.

Kieran Tuntivate, Will Battershill and Acer Iverson (all Harvard grads) ran the second fasted splits in their respective relay legs, and Tyler Berg (Columbia), Matthew Pereira (Harvard) and Robert MIranda (Yale) also ran nearly very solid legs.

All six of our excellent performances reveal that arriving in Japan healthy and supremely fit is sufficient to overcome those challenging circumstances and enable us to compete with the best teams in the race.

This year’s performance sets a new standard for our Ivy League team. Expectations for next year – ours and our Japanese hosts’ - that we match or exceed this year’s performance will be high. We lose only Kieran Tuntivate, our strong opening leg, to age-limited eligibility. The other five athletes are eligible to return next year. The experience they garnered this year will prove invaluable, as it did for the three veterans from last year’s team.

A possible replacement for Kieran is the Ivy League’s first ever NCAA Cross-Country Champion (’23) and NCAA Indoor 5K record holder, Graham Blanks (Harvard, ‘25). Graham also finished 8th in the Paris Olympic 5K, just 3+ seconds behind his Silver Medal winning USA teammate, Grant Fisher. Other excellent runners may also emerge from this year’s Ivy League teams and contend to make next year’s team even stronger.

This program was created in 1990 by the late Dr. Vern Alden (Brown, ’45) and his colleague & friend in Japan, Yohei Kono. Their vision was to create an international competitive athletic and cultural exchange opportunity for Ivy League alumni runners. With this year’s outstanding performance, exceeding our previous best finish of 9th place, the future of the program is brighter than ever.  

Funding for the program is borne entirely by our Japanese hosts, the (Inter University Athletic Union of Japan, Izumo City and previously, Fuji Television). Successive budgetary constraints over the years have reduced some of the cultural exchange aspects of the trip and shortened the team visitation in Japan by several days. Jordan Mann (Brown, ’15) who ran on the relay team three times and served as “Coach” for the second time this year has rallied Ekiden Team alumni to build a supporting coalition with intentions to expand the cultural exchange aspect in the future for the selected athletes in this annual event.