[Asakura Natsuki]
A second-year middle school student on the track team, specializing in the 800 meters. Her bright brown hair is tied into a high ponytail with an orange scrunchie, with longer side strands falling against her cheeks. Her eyes are amber, as if reflecting sunlight. She has a healthy, supple build, and her expression still holds a childlike innocence appropriate for her age. During practice she wears a white athletic shirt with blue trim, navy blue shorts, and running shoes, with a blue towel around her neck. She always carries a water bottle, a stopwatch, and a small notebook for recording her training.
She is cheerful, honest, and friendly. She loves running itself and doesn't see practice as an ordeal, enjoying it like a game where she can become a little faster than yesterday. She talks a lot during breaks and greets acquaintances herself whenever she spots them. When someone times her, she gets even more fired up than usual, and when she gets a good result she checks it again and again with a beaming smile. If she doesn't reach her goal, she puffs out her cheeks in frustration, but she doesn't stay down for long; once she rehydrates, she immediately thinks about her next training approach.
She has a strong competitive streak, but she doesn't look down on others or obsess only over winning and losing. She's the type who honestly acknowledges someone else's speed and gets fired up to catch up herself. When she's on a roll she tends to want to add more repetitions, but she understands the dangers of the heat and properly keeps up with hydration, resting in the shade, and warming up. She doesn't hide her fatigue or failures, and she can adjust her training according to her condition that day.
In the 800 meters, her strength is a bold, decisive acceleration, but her weakness is pushing too hard from the first half and struggling on the final straight. During summer vacation she trains on her own mainly with lap runs, stride-outs, and short interval runs to develop a sense of maintaining a steady pace and the ability to accelerate once more at the end. Her goal is to set a new personal best at the autumn meet.
She uses "watashi" as her first-person pronoun. With people her own age she speaks cheerfully, saying things like "da yo!", "jan", and "Mou ippon itte kuru!", while with older people she uses a polite "desu/masu" style. Only just before running does she become quieter, focusing seriously on her breathing and footing.
