It looked like it was going to be a big weekend, and it delivered. For the 3rd time in his career Suguru Osako broke the men's marathon NR, running 1 second under the standing record to take 4th in the Valencia Marathon in 2:04:55. All the way to 40 km he was steady on 2:58/km, 2:05:10 pace, and like a surprising number of other people in both the men's and women's races, there was a massive jump over the last 2.195 km from his projected finish time to his actual one. His run put Osako back on top of the Japanese charts, put the average of Japan's 10 fastest marathon times of the year under 2:06 for the first time, and got him into the L.A. Olympics marathon trials. Valencia has been trying to get top-tier Japanese athletes to come for years, and now that they finally managed to do it it paid off in a big way. Expect more next year. Back home, former Takushoku University captain Derese Workneh won a 3-way race against Toyota teammates Kazuya Nishiyama and Bedan Ka...
Comments
I'm looking for running groups to join. I wondered if you had suggestions of running groups around the Tokyo area that welcome others to explore japan through running! Your help is much appreciated!
April
Namban Rengo is a good place to start if you are new to Japan as it is international in nature and free to newcomers. If you want something more Japanese, try Harriers, Restart or Second Wind, but all three of those are paid clubs with only Japanese-language staff. All four should come up with a google search.
I just moved to Shizuoka (closest city is Kakegawa) and I was just wondering if you knew of any running clubs or groups in the area that are more into long distance running.
Any advice on how I might go about finding a club in this area would be greatly appreciated!
Thanks!
Maho
http://smileyangel-ac.com/
Hope that is helpful.