The East Japan Corporate Federation published featured athlete entry lists for next month's Hachioji Long Distance meet on its website on Oct. 10. The meet takes place Nov. 23 at Hachioji's Kamiyugi Field and will include 5000 m races this year along with its usual program of 10000 m races. In addition, a special heat of 10000 m is being set up to target the Japanese national record of 27:09.80 and the Tokyo World Championships qualifying standard, 27:00.00.
Announced for that heat are NR holder Kazuya Shiojiri (27:09.80, Fujitsu), 2024 national champion and Paris Olympian Jun Kasai (27:17.46, Asahi Kasei), and 2022 and 2023 World Championships team member Ren Tazawa (27:22.31, Toyota). Tazawa commented, "There aren't that many races either in Japan or overseas that are set up for 26 minutes, so this is a really important chance to become the first Japanese athlete to run under 27 minutes."
Others on featured athlete list include Mebuki Suzuki (27:26.67, Toyota), Ayumu Kobayashi (27:28.13, NTT Nishi Nihon), Kotaro Shinohara (27:35.05, Komazawa Univ.) and Yusuke Tamura (27:43.11, Kurosaki Harima). Sitonik Kiprono (27:12.27, Kurosaki Harima) has been hired as pacer.
The Hachioji Long Distance meet is held in late November every year at Kamiyugi Field or Hosei University's Tama Campus Field. Since the meet began in 1998 it has been the site of many great performances including a 27:29.69 NR in 2015 by Kota Murayama (Asahi Kasei) and a 27:28.50 U20 NR by Keita Sato (Komazawa Univ.) last year.
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