Skip to main content

Osaka Announces 2011 Elite Women's Field

by Brett Larner

On Dec. 20 the organizers of the Osaka International Women's Marathon announced the field for the 2011 edition. Celebrating the event's 30th anniversary with a new, faster course eliminating the famous hilly, twisting section through Osaka Castle and with the addition of female pacemakers, the field features a competitive cross-section of current top Japanese women and several aging overseas elites.

Osaka is the first major domestic selection race for the 2011 World Championships team. The top Japanese woman meeting Rikuren's time goals will be automatically named to the team. If the race is slow then the top domestic finisher will have to wait until mid-March for the final selection announcement. It doesn't look likely to be slow, however. Yukiko Akaba (Team Hokuren) is the favorite, coming fresh from a sub-32 road 10k in Sunday's National Jitsugyodan Women's Ekiden in the midst of her marathon training. Akaba says she will be shooting for a fast time, not just the win, and having gone out on 2:21 pace at last year's race while injured she may well follow through. Yumiko Hara (Team Univ. Ent.) is the other major domestic favorite, with the fastest PB among the Japanese women but a major coaching change this year and several recent absences from competition following her win at August's Hokkaido Marathon. Solid 2006 Vienna Marathon winner Tomo Morimoto (Team Tenmaya), the lone reliable marathoner in the stable of fast-debuting one-hit wonders turned out by Tenmaya head coach and Rikuren director of women's marathoning Yutaka Taketomi, is another major contender for the World Championships spot.

Among the relative newcomers in the Japanese field, watch for Ryoko Kizaki (Team Daihatsu), one of the all-around best-performing Japanese women of 2010, and Mai Ito (Team Otsuka Seiyaku), who had a good debut earlier this year in Nagoya, to move up and be in contention. A possible strike against Ito: Her teammate Atsushi Ikawa, who likewise had a good debut in the spring, DNF'd in his follow-up at this month's Fukuoka International Marathon.

Three of the six overseas invited elites are over age 38, including seemingly indefatigable Russians Liudmila Petrova and Svetlana Zakharova. Among the younger half of the overseas runners is Romanian Adriana Pirtea, who memorably lost the Chicago Marathon to Ethiopian Berhane Adere by celebrating her victory prematurely.

2011 Osaka International Women's Marathon
Liudmila Petrova (Russia) - 2:21:29 (London '06)
Svetlana Zakharova (Russia) - 2:21:31 (Chicago '02)
Yumiko Hara (Team Univ. Ent.) - 2:23:48(Osaka '07)
Adriana Fernandez (Mexico) - 2:24:06 (London '99)
Tomo Morimoto (Team Tenmaya) - 2:24:33 (Vienna '06)
Yukiko Akaba (Team Hokuren) - 2:24:55 (London '10)
Miki Ohira (Team Mitsui Sumitomo Kaijo) - 2:26:09 (Osaka '08)
Chika Horie (Team Univ. Ent.) - 2:26:11 (Hokkaido '02)
Mika Okunaga (Team Kyudenko) - 2:27:16 (Osaka '09)
Ryoko Kizaki (Team Daihatsu) - 2:27:34 (Osaka '10)
Anna Incerti (Italy) - 2:27:42 (Milan '08)
Adriana Pirtea (Romania) - 2:28:52 (London '08)
Mai Ito (Team Otsuka Seiyaku) - 2:29:13 (Nagoya '10)
Tetyana Holovchenko (Ukraine) - 2:31:37 (Warsaw '10)
Hiroko Miyauchi (Team Kyocera) - 2:32:20 (Yokohama '09)
Yoko Miyauchi (Team Kyocera) - 2:33:36 (Nagoya '10)

pacemakers
Noriko Higuchi (Team Wacoal)
Aniko Kalovics (Hungary)
Kaori Urata (Team Tenmaya)

(c) 2010 Brett Larner
all rights reserved
Labels:

Comments

Anonymous said…
Thanks for all the great info on the Japanese runners. I was just wondering if Japanese endurance races distribute the "space blankets" for the runners after each race? I looked at tons of pictures but haven't seen any.
December 22, 2010 at 5:09 AM
Brett Larner said…
At your service. I don't remember ever seeing them here, but many races have finishers' towels instead. You'll often see people being draped with them at the finish line in the race broadcasts. They're usually full-sized bath towels printed with the race name, logo and date. Much nicer than disposable mylar sheets, although if you race here enough you start to have the same problem as with race t-shirts.
December 22, 2010 at 7:15 AM
Post a Comment

Most-Read This Week

Saku Chosei H.S. Makes It 2 In a Row - National High School Ekiden Boys' Race

While the girls' race was a blowout by 2022 champ Nagano Higashi H.S. , the boys' race at Sunday's National High School Ekiden was a tense battle of turnover that saw all of the final top four teams take a stab at leading. 2023 3rd-placer Yachiyo Shoin H.S. handled the first 2 of the 7 stages in the 42.195 km race, with lead runner Rui Suzuki delivering a bold run on the 10.0 km First Stage that produced the fastest-ever time by a Japanese runner on the stage, 28:43, and put Yachiyo Shoin 29 seconds out front. Last year's Fifth Stage CR breaker Tetsu Suzuki ran Yachiyo Shoin down to put 2023 champ Saku Chosei H.S. into 1st on the 8.1075 km Third Stage, but Genta Sugano of last year's 8th-placer Sendai Ikuei H.S. had other plans and took the lead on the 8.0875 km Fourth Stage. Smiling and fist pumping to the crowd almost the entire way, Taketo Tsukada of last year's 6th-placer Omuta H.S. moved up from 3rd to 1st by 2 seconds over Saku Chosei on the 3.0 k...
Post a Comment
Read more

Japan Post Holds Off Sekisui Kagaku to Win Queens Ekiden National Title

  Japan Post  was back on top at the Queens Ekiden corporate women's national championships Sunday in Sendai, holding off last year's winner Sekisui Kagaku  over the second half of a race that came as close as 1 second to take 1st with a final margin of victory of 27 seconds. Sekisui Kagaku was out fast with a win on the 7.0 km opening leg by Erika Tanoura  and a new CR for the 12:56 second leg by Yuma Yamamoto , 17 seconds better than her own CR from last year. Last year's 4th-placer Shiseido  briefly led on the 10.6 km third leg with an excellent 33:17 stage win from Rino Goshima , but behind her Japan Post's Ririka Hironaka  returned from her latest injury problems to pass Sekisui Kagaku's Sayaka Sato  and hand off 6 seconds ahead. New recruit Caroline Kariba  ran Shiseido down on the 3.6 km fourth leg and put Japan Post 22 seconds ahead of Sekisui Kagaku, but a duel of marathoners between JP's  Ayuko Suzuki  and Sekisui's Hitomi Niiy...
1 comment
Read more

Nagano Higashi Girls Lead Start to Finish to Win National High School Ekiden

2022 National High School Ekiden girls' champion Nagano Higashi H.S. was back in force after a 5th-place finish last year, leading start to finish to win this year's national title Sunday in Kyoto. Lead runner Airi Mashiba kicked it off with a 19:30 stage win on the 6.0 km opening leg, something that head coach Fumio Yokouchi said later that he hadn't been expecting. That ended up being Nagano Higashi's only individual stage win in the 5-leg, 21.0975 km race, but the rest of its team ran well enough to hold a lead that was never less than 11 seconds but never more than 21. Last year's 4th-placer Kunei Joshi Gakuin H.S. spent most of the race in 2nd, but over the second half of the race Sendai Ikuei H.S. , 2nd last year by just 1 second, came from further back to run Kunei down on the anchor stage thanks in big part to a critical stage win on the 4th leg by Tsubomi Tezuka that put anchor Aoi Hosokawa in position to catch Kunei's Mizuki Oda . Nagano Higashi ...
Post a Comment
Read more