 Inada (left) during an exhibition gala in 1937 | |
| Personal information | |
|---|---|
| Native name | 稲田 悦子 |
| Born | (1924-02-08)February 8, 1924 Osaka, Japan |
| Died | July 8, 2003(2003-07-08) (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 aJapanesefigure skater who mostly competed in singles. She was the first female athlete to represent Japan at the Winter Olympics.[2]
Inada was born on February 8, 1924 inOsaka. Her family ran a watch store, and she was the youngest of three sisters.[3]
Inada began skating at eight years old after watching an ice show; her two older sisters also began skating for a short time.[3][4] She was a seven-timeJapanese national champion.[5] She won the junior women's division at theJapanese Championships when it was trialed in 1935, then won the first senior women's championships the next season later that year.[3]
Her coach was Kōzō Nagai. Nagai had no experience with skating himself, but he was an enthusiast of the sport and contributed to its spread in Japan.[3]
After competing at the1936 European Championships,[3] at the age of 12, she was the first female athlete to represent Japan at the1936 Winter Olympics.[5] While competing there, she wore a costume given to her by the Japanese Women's Association of Berlin.[2] Shortly after, she also competed at the1936 World Championships and placed 10th.Theresa Weld, writing forSkating magazine, wrote that she was well-liked by the other skaters and that, "She can do almost every thing on both feet, which is most unusual", and she also praised her ability to learn new elements quickly.[6]
Between 1937 and 1941, she won five consecutive Japanese national titles.[3]
After the war, Inada 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.[7] Her last competition was the1951 World Figure Skating Championships, where she placed 21st of 23 skaters.[8] In 1952, she turned professional.[3]
Later in her life, she opened a store inAoyama, 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.[9][10] Her students included Olympic skatersMiwa Fukuhara,Junko Hiramatsu, andHaruko Okamoto. She died in 2003 from stomach cancer.[4]
| 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 | ||||||||
