Ozaki, Onishi, Kizaki Crack World Half Top 10 as Women Take 5th-Straight Bronze

by Brett Larner

2009 World Championships marathon silver medalist Yoshimi Ozaki (Team Daiichi Seimei) and 2010 National Corporate 10000 m champion Ryoko Kizaki (Team Daihatsu) led the way for the Japanese women to secure their fifth-straight bronze medal at the Oct. 16 World Half Marathon Championships in Nanning, China. In a relatively slow race, Ozaki and Kizaki ran together with Chinese rival Xiolin Zhu in a second pack behind the exclusively Kenyan and Ethiopian lead group. While winner Florence Kiplagat (Kenya) ran 1:08:24 to win by a margin of 10 seconds over Ethiopian Dire Tune, Zhu, Ozaki and Kizaki finished over a span of only two seconds with Zhu taking 8th in 1:11:01. Ozaki's teammate Azusa Nojiri (Team Daiichi Seimei), a former pro XC skiier, rounded out the scoring for the Japanese women with a 13th-place finish in 1:11:35.

Fresh from running the top 10000 m time of the year by a Japanese man, 27:50.72, former Toyo University captain Tomoya Onishi (Team Asahi Kasei) delivered another big PB run with a 1:01:31 for 9th, again the fastest time of the year by a Japanese man. First-year pro and former Komazawa University ace Tsuyoshi Ugachi (Team Konica Minolta) was close behind with a large PB of his own, 1:01:49 for 12th. Much-respected Hakone Ekiden 'Mountain God' Masato Imai (Team Toyota Kyushu), a past training partner of Chicago Marathon winner Samuel Wanjiru (Kenya), was Japan's third scorer in 1:03:28, his best of the year. The Japanese men finished 4th in the team scoring but impressively were only 1:22 behind the bronze medal-winning Ethiopian team. With this performance Onishi looks set to become one of the leaders of the current crop of under-25 Japanese men.

2010 World Half Marathon - Top Results
click here for complete results
Women
1. Florence Kiplagat (Kenya) - 1:08:24
2. Dire Tune (Ethiopia) - 1:08:34
3. Peninah Arusei (Kenya) - 1:09:05
4. Feyse Tadese (Ethiopia) - 1:09:28 - PB
5. Joyce Chepkirui (Kenya) - 1:09:30 - PB
6. Meseret Mengistu (Ethiopia) -1:09:31 - PB
7. Fate Tola (Ethiopia) - 1:09:38 - PB
8. Xiaolin Zhu (China) - 1:11:01
9. Yoshimi Ozaki (Team Daiichi Seimei) - 1:11:02
10. Ryoko Kizaki (Team Daihatsu) - 1:11:03
-----
13. Azusa Nojiri (Team Daiichi Seimei) - 1:11:35
15. Hiroko Miyauchi (Team Kyocera) - 1:11:40
29. Noriko Higuchi (Team Wacoal) - 1:14:56

Men
1. Wilson Kiprop (Kenya) - 1:00:07
2. Zersenay Tadese (Eritrea) - 1:00:11
3. Sammy Kitwara (Kenya) - 1:00:22
4. Silas Kipruto (Kenya) - 1:01:03
5. Samuel Tsegay (Ethiopia) - 1:01:13
6. Titus Masai (Kenya) - 1:01:24
7. Lelisa Desisa (Ethiopia) - 1:01:28
8. Birhanu Bekele (Ethiopia) - 1:01:28 - PB
9. Tomoya Onishi (Team Asahi Kasei) 1:01:31 - PB
10. Moses Mosop (Kenya) - 1:01:31
-----
12. Tsuyoshi Ugachi (Team Konica Minolta) - 1:01:49 - PB
21. Masato Imai (Team Toyota Kyushu) - 1:03:28
31. Osamu Ibata (Team Otsuka Seiyaku) - 1:04:49
65. Akihiko Tsumurai (Team Mazda) - 1:13:28

Team Results
Women
1. Kenya - 3:26.59
2. Ethiopia - 3:27:33
3. Japan - 3:33:40

Men
1. Kenya - 3:01.32
2. Eritrea - 3:03:04
3. Ethiopia - 3:05:26
4. Japan - 3:06:48

(c) 2010 Brett Larner
all rights reserved

Federation Tells World Championships Marathoner Horibata To Go On Diet

http://hochi.yomiuri.co.jp/sports/etc/news/20110307-OHT1T00258.htm translated by Brett Larner Having made the 2011 World Championships marathon team by running a PB of 2:09:25 to come in 3rd overall and as the top Japanese finisher at the Mar. 6 Lake Biwa Mainichi Marathon, Hiroyuki Horibata (24, Team Asahi Kasei), talked to the media at Osaka Airport on Mar. 7. Following Sunday's race Rikuren director Keisuke Sawaki , 67, told Horibata, "Let's cut things down a bit until the World Championships," directing him to go on a diet. The 189 cm Horibata weighs 72 kg [~6'3", 160 lbs]. When he joined Team Asahi Kasei in 2005 at age 18 he weighed 65 kg, and this weight is still generally listed on his profile at races and in the media. "For some reason it never changes," he said with a grin. His coach Takeshi Soh , 58, commented, "If he was hungrier for glory his world would change completely," slapping the 'heavyweight division runner...

World Marathon Majors Japanese Entries

We're back from a short summer break. A week and a half out from the first race of the season's four World Marathon Majors races, here's a look at Japanese athletes scheduled to run. Everything right now is about qualifying for the MGC Race, the official trials race for the 2028 Los Angeles Olympics to be held in the fall of 2027 in Nagoya. The JAAF makes no mistake about wanting to keep its top people racing domestically where it can get a share of revenue from the TV broadcast and race operations, so anyone who decides to race overseas has to do it in a WA platinum label race and hit either 2:06:30 or 2:23:30, regardless of place, course or weather if they want to make the trials. At the same time concessions are make for domestic races, like for example the late-August Hokkaido Marathon where up to 3 men and 3 women can qualify if they go 2:12:00 or 2:32:00. As a result, you get things like last year where amateur runner Yudai Fukuda made the trials by finishing 3rd Jap...

Nakajima Breaks 100 mH NR Twice, Kitaguchi Returns - August Track Roundup

Catching up on what's been happening in track and field this month during our summer break: Men's 3000 m NR holder Nagiya Mori was just off his 5000 m PB at the IFAM Oordegem meet in Belgium on Aug. 1, taking 16th in 13:15.01. Shota Nakano was 26th of 28 in 13:35.02. This year's national champion Ryoma Aoki ran the 3000 mSC but didn't finish. Naoto Hasegawa was the only Japanese athlete at Mutaz Essa Barshim 's What Gravity Tour stop at the Monaco Athletics Festival meet on Aug. 5. Having cleared 2.30 m for the first time earlier this year Hasegawa only managed 2.18 m in Monaco, taking 7th of 10. There were a lot of good performances at the Fuji Hokuriku World Trial meet in Fujiyoshida on Aug. 9, but the one that got the headlines was a 12.62 (-0.2) NR in the women's 100 mH by Hitomi Nakajima . Nakajima actually did it twice, running 12.62 (+2.0) in the heats before repeating in the final. Masumi Aoki also ran big in the heats, with a 12.68 (+2.0) for al...

japan running news

Search This Blog