Selemon Barega of Ethiopia won the men's 10,000-meter event on Friday to claim the first athletics gold of the Tokyo Olympics.
The Olympic debutant put on a huge last-lap kick to break the race open and was able to hold on to finish in 27 minutes, 43.22 seconds, less than one second ahead of a pair of Ugandans, silver medalist Joshua Cheptegei and bronze medalist Jacob Kiplimo.
It is Ethiopia's sixth gold medal in the event's history, taking it one closer to record holder Finland which has seven titles.
For Japan, Akira Aizawa ran a season's best of 28:18.37 to finish 17th and Tatsuhiko Ito crossed in 22nd.
Japanese 19-year-old Ryuji Miura made headlines for Japan, running the second-fastest qualifying time of the heats, 8:09.92, to reach the 3,000 steeplechase final in national record time.
Miura is the first Japanese to reach the final of the event at the Olympics in 49 years.
Japanese entrant Naoto Tobe bounced to a place in the men's high jump final, clearing the 2.28-meter qualifying height.
Japan had one qualifier in the men's 400 hurdles, Hiromu Yamauchi finishing third in his heat to qualify to the semifinal automatically.
Ririka Hironaka ran a personal best of 14:55.87 to win Japan's only place in the women's 5,000 final with Nozomi Tanaka missing out by one place despite also running a personal best.
In the women's 100, Ivoirian Marie-Josee Ta Lou set the fastest time of the seven round-one heats, a surprisingly swift 10.78 seconds, with the Jamaican pair of Elaine Thompson-Herah (10.82) and Shelly-Ann Fraser-Pryce (10.84) clocking the second and third quickest times.
The biggest shock of the evening session came in the 4x400 mixed relay when the hot-favorite American team were disqualified when one of their runners was deemed to have started outside the takeover zone, vacating their first-place finish in their heat. Poland and the Netherlands set the fastest times of the two heats.
