Etsuko Inada
| Etsuko Inada | |
|---|---|
 Inada (left) during an exhibition gala in 1937 | |
| Native name | 稲田 悦子 |
| Born | February 8, 1924 Osaka, Japan |
| Died | July 8, 2003 (aged 79) Chiba, Chiba, Japan |
| Figure skating career | |
| Country |  Japan |
| Began skating | 1932 |
| Retired | 1952 |
Etsuko Inada (稲田 悦子, Inada Etsuko, Hiragana: いなだ えつこ; February 8, 1924 – July 8, 2003)[1] was a Japanese figure skater who mostly competed in singles. She was the first female athlete to represent Japan at the Winter Olympics.[2]
Inada began skating at eight years old.[3] She was a seven-time Japanese national champion and represented Japan at the 1936 Winter Olympics at the age of 12.[4] While competing there, she wore a costume given to her by the Japanese Women's Association of Berlin.[2]
After the war, she married and had a son. She returned to competitive skating and won a competition shortly before the planned 1949 Japanese national championships, but the national championships were cancelled due to the weather becoming too warm.[5] Her last competition was the 1951 World Figure Skating Championships.
Later in her life, she opened a store in Aoyama, Tokyo and coached at a rink in front of the Prince Chichibu Memorial Sports Museum, which holds her costume from the Olympics in its collection.[6][7] Her students included Olympic skaters Miwa Fukuhara, Junko Hiramatsu, and Haruko Okamoto. She died in 2003 from stomach cancer.[3]
Competitive highlights[edit]
| International | |||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Event | 1933–34 | 1934–35 | 1935–36 | 1936–37 | 1937–38 | 1938–39 | 1939–40 | 1940–41 | 1950–51 |
| Olympics | 10th | ||||||||
| Worlds | 10th | 21st | |||||||
| Europeans | 9th | ||||||||
| National | |||||||||
| Japan | 1st | 1st | 1st | 1st | 1st | 1st | 1st | ||
| Japan Jr. | 1st | ||||||||
References[edit]
- ^ "Etsuko Inada". sports-reference.com. Archived from the original on 2013-10-20.
- ^ a b Kietlinski, Robin (2011). Japanese women and sport: beyond baseball and sumo. Globalizing sport studies. London: Bloomsbury. p. 82. ISBN 978-1-84966-340-3.
- ^ a b "フィギュア界の草分け稲田悦子さんが死去" [Trailblazing figure skater Inada Etsuko has died]. Nikkan Sports (in Japanese). 2021-03-07. Archived from the original on 7 March 2021. Retrieved 2024-03-02.
- ^ 1936年の冬季オリンピックで12歳のフィギュアスケート選手 [12-year-old figure skater Etsuko Inada at the 1936 Olympics] (in Japanese). Japanese Olympic Committee. November 24, 2005. Archived from the original on December 3, 2005.
- ^ "Skating Around the World" (PDF). Skating. May 1949. p. 33. Retrieved 2 March 2024.
- ^ 三上, 孝道 (2013-08-24). "稲田悦子のコスチューム ～12歳のフィギュアスケーター" [Inada Estuko's Costume: The 12-year-old Figure Skater]. Japanese Olympic Committee (in Japanese). Archived from the original on 24 August 2013. Retrieved 2024-03-02.
- ^ "稲田悦子のコスチューム（フィギュアスケート）" [Inada Etsuko's Costume (Figure skating)]. Prince Chichibu Memorial Sports Museum. (in Japanese). 2017-09-06. Archived from the original on 6 September 2017. Retrieved 2024-03-02.
External links[edit]
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