Yukiya Arashiro (Europcar) has been one of the two leading Japanese cyclists for a number of years and today he underlined his position by taking a dominant win at his national championships. He finished 6.15 ahead of 2nd placed Miyataka Shimizu (Bridgestone Anchor) while Nariyuki Masuda (Cannondale) completed the podium.

Yukiya Arashiro has shown some splendid condition recently, performing well in both the Tour of Belgium and Tour de Luxembourg, and today that form earned him the right to wear the Japanese national champion's jersey for the second time in his career. The Europcar rider was totally dominant on the 180km course in Bungoono and put no less than 6.15 into his nearest challenger Miyataka Shimizu while Nariyuki Masuda finished 2.59 further adrift in 3rd.

Arch rival Fumiyuki Beppu (Orica-GreenEdge) had skipped the event and so Arashiro was the big favourite to repeat his 2007 win at the event. He will now take the jersey back to Europe and hopes to get his first chance to show off his new colours in the Tour de France which starts on Saturday. His Europcar team has not made its selection for the race known and will not do so until the French national championships have finished later today.

You can follow the French, the Belgian and the Dutch championships at 14.40 on CyclingQuotes.com/live.

Result:

1. Yukiya Arashiro 6.17.31

2. Miytaka Shimizu +6.15

3. Nariyuki Masuda +9.14

4. Masakazu Ito +9.54

5. Shinichi Fukushima +10.48