I asked turumaki-kozou about the Tour of Japan which is listed in the UCI Calendar as running between May 11 and May 19. He replied that the race:
"you mention should be the race called "1996 TOUR OF JAPAN", which will be held from 18/5 to 26/5 including two rest days. This race has been held at different cities in different days in recent years. It was not like a stage race because the interval of the races is greater than two days. But this year it is to be much closer to what is called "stage race". The organizer has commercialised the Race and is promoting it as the biggest STAGE race ever held in Asia with official recognition of UCI".
18/5 Sat SAKAI 2.50km ITT 19/5 Sun OSAKA 140.80km ordinary criterium 20/5 Mon SUZUKA 140.73km circuit course 21/5 Tues Rest Day 22/5 Wed FUJI 134.10km circuit course 23/5 Thu SHUZENJI 136.00km special criterium 24/5 Fri Rest Day 25/5 Sat UTSUNOMIYA 154.50km 26/5 Sun TOKYO 154.22km total 862.85km
OSAKA is the second day of the race, but in fact, it is also held inside of SAKAI city. the name of OSAKA is used because of its familiarity, I suppose.
SUZUKA is located about 100km east of OSAKA, three hundred west of TOKYO. It is famous for F1 Grand Prix Circuit in motor sports. In fact, they use the circuit course for the cycling race. Also, FUJI is a F1 GP motor sport circuit. I use the word "circuit course" to distinguish it from the ordinary type of criterium races.
SHUZENJI is very famous to Japanese cyclists, since we have a lot of races there. In fact, when I raced in Univ, almost all the road races were held there. It is a closed circuit course, so I have never raced an open-road race!!
There is 5km circuit course including a steep of 12% called "heart breaking hill". But since the distance of 136km is not a multiple of 5km, which is the course length, I suppose they will run the race on open roads too.
UTSUNOMIYA is well known to you, I think. They will ride perhaps the same course as world cup race this year.
TOKYO stage starts at HIBIYA then head to OI-futoh circuit course. OI-futoh ("futoh" means a port of transportation in japanese) is very popular excercising place for cyclists who live in TOKYO area. There are no cars allowed on Sundays.
Invited countries are AUSTRALIA, CHINA, KOREA, FRANCE, ITALIA and USA. Fifteen teams are said to be participating. I don't know if professionals will be racing but usually this race has been only for amateurs.
TV program is said to be available at 9/6 sun 15:00-16:30 on NHK broadcast satellite channel. This information is based on newspaper advertisement by the organizer. it is one page on volume, which is exceptionally large for this sport in Japan.
I am going to watch the TOKYO stage and I will send a report to you then.
today, in japan, there hold a final professional race on Olympic track race. results is not available yet.
This list is from the source of co-organiser newspaper company, ASAHI newspaper, one of the three biggest newspaper in Japan. Since the original list is described in Japanese, question marks indicate that the name spelling of that rider is uncertain or not precise.
In Japanese, we use three different characters, Hiragana, Katakana and Kanji (Chinese character). And we usually use Hiraganas and Kanjis. Hiragana has only one pronounciation to each character. But Kanji, which is very close to that is used in China and Taiwan but is not the same, has several different ways of pronouncing the names of the riders.
So I cannot distinguish the true way of pronouncing the names of the riders from China and Korea. Even Japanese riders who are not familiar to me are not understood correctly. Even worse, The two countries have original pronounciations of Kanji which are very different from the way we use the sounds in Japan.
For example, we call him "kin" and Korean people call him "kim". We call late north Korean minister "Kin Nissei" but they call him "kim Iruson"! What a difference!! The same is applied to western riders. We use Katakana characters when decribing western words. It resembles to native prnouciation but somewhat modified. So I cannot put the western rider names described in Katakana back to the real spelling except when the names are very easy like David etc.
So when you use this list, please be aware of this.
AUSTRALIA 1 Rodny Maggy becomes Rodney McGee 2 Tony Morfett becomes Tony Morphett 3 Tim Christopher same 4 Baden Barc becomes Baden Burke 5 Nathan Oniel becomes Nathan O'Neill 6 Brent Johnson same CHINA 7?Kaihou Son becomes Hai-peng Sun 8?Hinkou Son becomes Bao-hong Sun 9?Kousyun Han becomes Guang-chun Pan 10?Kouhin Cho becomes Hong-bin Zhao 11?Tenmei Tou becomes Tian-ming Tao 12?Kenun So KOREA 13?Minsyu Boku becomes Jung-ho Kwon 14?Seikan Chi becomes Min-soo Park 15?Seikou Ken becomes Sung-hwan Ji 16?Eikon Hai becomes Young-keun Bae 17?Chintai Kin becomes Suk-kil Yong 18?Shomo Kin becomes Ho-sung Cho FRANCE 19?Frederic Delarande becomes Frederic Dealalande 20?Cyriac Dubal becomes Cyriaque Duval 21?Deby Lefabl becomes David Lefevre 22?Anthony Rangella becomes Anthony Langella 23?Olyvie Uvral becomes Ollivier Ouvrard 24?Jean Phillipe Dulaca becomes Jean-Philippe Durack ITALIA 25?Raulia Mirco becomes Lauria Mirko 26?Correzzione Michele becomes Colleoni Michele 27?Basso Ivan becomes Basso Ivan 28?Kina Valentino becomes China Valentino 29?Negrini Emanuelle Negrini Emanuele 30?Rezzani Michele Rezzani Michele USA 31?Shone Van Cort becomes Sean Van Court 32?Shene Sellman becomes Shane Thelman 33?Carc Obby becomes Kirk O'Beeealalande 34?Mat Decanio becomes Matt Decanio 35?David Kringer becomes David Clinger 36?Norman Carter becomes Norman Carter ACOM-RAVENELLO (ACOM is money cashing company and RAVANELLO is the brand name of frame maker.) 37 Naoshi Ohno 38 Makoto Iijima 39 Roland Muller (CHE) 40 Asao Shinpo 41?Shindai Mashita becomes Nobuhiro Mashimo 42 Kouki Nagai MBK-YAMAHA-AZUMINO Pi (JAPAN Amateur) (MBK is a cycle company whose team in Europe is very famous. YAMAHA is a motor-engine ralated company, such as motor-boat and motorbike. AZUMINO Pi is a amateur bike club based at Shinshu are, where the riders gather in convenient circumstances for training.) 43 Syuekuon Tan (CHN) 44 Kazuo Ooishi 45?Robert Du Pool (HLD) becomes Robert De Poel 46?Daisuke Nakayama becomes Daisuke Nakayama 47?Wataru Sekiguchiq becomes Wataru Sekiguchi 48?Naoshi Nakata becomes Takeshi Nakata SHIMANO (JAPAN Amateur) (SHIMANO is a very famous company, you know.) 49 Osamu Sumita 50 Masamitsu Ehara 51 Hisafumi Imanishi 52 Osamu Kurimura 53 Tsutomu Muraoka 54 Hisashi Matsui Nippon Hodoh (JAPAN Amateur) (Nippon Hodoh is a road surfacing copmpany and tennis court construction company and so on.) 55 Keita Seino 56 Fumio Shiogami 57 Akira Kakinuma 58 Yasuhiro Nito 59 Andorea Guidtty (CHE) 60?Georgeo Orgerti (ITA) becomes Giorgio Olgiti BRIDGESTONE CYCLE (JAPAN Amateur) (Bridgestone is a famous manufacturer of bicycle and car tyres) 61 Kouzou Fujita 62 Junichi Shibuya 63 Tetsuya Okada 64 Shinri Suzuki 65 Shinichi Fukushima 66?Masahiro Mizutani becomes Takehiro Mizutani MIYATA (JAPAN Amateur) (MIYATA is also a bicycle manufacturer, whose Koga-MIYATA bike was very popular in Europe.) 67 Kazuyuki Manabe 68 Masanari Date 69 Yasuhiro Andoh 70 Hideto Yukinari 71?Akihiro Ohsawa becomes Akihiro Osawa 72?Akio Soga becomes Akio Soga Cheblo-Art Nature(JAPAN Amateur) (This team is composed of the riders who have graduated Nihon Univ., which is the strongest college in Japan. This Univ has won ten or more consecutive times in recent collegiate games. 73 Ichikawa is the first Japanese pro rider, who rode for HITACHI, FRANK-TOYO, BLEIKER, NAVIGARE. Art Nature is a wig making company famous for TV commercials which KOICHI NAKANO plays in them.) 73 Masatoshi Ichikawa 74 Naokiyo Hashisako 75 Makio Madarame 76 Ken Okamoto 77?Kouichi Tetsuzawa becomes Koichi Tetsuzawa 78 Yuichi Yanai Japan Student Cycling Federation (JAPAN Amateur) 79 Hitoshi Takahashi (Chuo Univ) 80 Hidenori Nodera (Hohsei Univ) 81 Ken Akita (Kyoto-Sangyo Univ) 82 Keiichi Ono (Chuo Univ) 83?Yugo Horiuchi (Ritsumeikan Univ) becomes Yugo Horiuchi 84?Nobutaka Namioka (Chuo Univ) becomes Yoshitaka Namioka Japan Professional Cyclist Association (JAPAN Pro) 85 Kyoushi Miura (TONISTINA-SAXON,ITA) 86 Daisuke Imanaka (POLTI,ITA) 87 Katahiro Yamada (INOAC-DEKI,JPN) 88 Tomokazu Fujino (INOAC-DEKI,JPN) 89 Akira Asada (free) 90 Yukiharu Mori (free)