japan running news

by Brett Larner
video by naoki620

With universities in the Kanto Region gearing up for the season-ending Hakone Ekiden on Jan. 2-3 the KGRR held its annual 10000 m time trial meet Sunday, moved this year from Tokyo's soon-to-be-demolished National Stadium to one of the most beautiful tracks in Japan, Keio University's Hiyoshi Field in Kanagawa.  Sixteen men's 10000 m heats and one women's 10000 m filled up most of the day until well beyond sunset.



In the fastest men's heat, 2014 Copenhagen World Half Marathon Championships team member Hiroto Inoue (Yamanashi Gakuin Univ.) ran a PB 28:19.28 for the win over last year's top finisher Takuya Fujikawa (Aoyama Gakuin Univ.), whose 28:20.31 was a new AGU school record.  Inoue and Fujikawa ran in a front pack of five that included Kazuma Kubota (Aoyama Gakuin Univ.), Hironori Tsuetaki (Chuo Gakuin Univ.) and Yusuke Osumi (Daito Bunka Univ.), virtually all five men taking turns keeping the pace steady at 2:50/km, 28:20 p…

by Brett Larner
photo courtesy of David Monti, Race Results Weekly

Asian junior record holder Yoshihide Kiryu (Toyo Univ.) brought Japan its first medal of the 2014 IAAF World Junior Championships, taking bronze in 10.34 (-0.6) behind Americans Kendal Williams and Trayvon Bromell.  Kiryu gave the nation a scare by barely making it to the final when he finished 4th in his semi-final.  In both the semi and final he displayed problems with the second half of his race, but what he had on the day proved enough for him to get on the podium and join past World Juniors medalists like Shota Iizuka and Genki Dean in the Japanese books.

Further history was made when both Nobuya Kato and Kaisei Yui got through the semis to make the men's 400 m final, the first time two Japanese athletes have ever made a world-level final.  Both won their opening heats yesterday.  In semi-final 1, Yui ran a PB 46.68 to get into the final on time.  Kato, running semi-final 2, came from far back in the last 100 …

by Brett Larner

A local Ugandan newspaper as tweeted by WUCCC organizers FISU.

Hosts Uganda dominated the 19th edition of the World University Cross Country Championships Mar. 22 in Entebbe, winning both individual gold medals and the women's team gold.  The women's race, four laps of a roughly 1.5 km loop, went out as a race between Uganda and neighboring Kenya, with Kenya's Sheila Kandie leading Uganda's Winnie Nanyondo and Dorcus Ajok through the first lap before Nanyondo moved to the front.  Uganda's third woman, Prim Twikiriza, sat a few seconds back in the chase back with Japan's Ayumi Uehara, Fuyuka Kimura and Natsumi Ozawa.

On the third lap Nanyondo surged, covering it in 4:56.24, to drop both Kandie and Ajok, and from there she ran alone all the way to the finish to claim gold by a margin of nearly 30 seconds.  Ajok also got clear of Kandie on the third lap for silver, but on the fourth lap she was nearly run down by Twikiriza who surged hard to shake o…

http://www.iuau.jp/news/2014/19wuxc_delegate.pdf

Following the selection race at last weekend's Fukuoka International Cross Country Meet, the IUAU has announced the Japanese men's and women's team lineups for the Mar. 22 World University Cross Country Championships in Entebbe, Uganda.  Hiroshi Ichida (Daito Bunka Univ.) is the only returning member of Japan's 2012 World University XC team, where Yuta Shitara (Toyo Univ.) and Daichi Motomura (Tokai Univ.) won silver and bronze medals respectively.  Ichida was 24th.  A week before this year's Worlds his identical twin brother Takashi Ichida (Daito Bunka Univ.) will run the New York City Half Marathon with support from JRN.

19th World University Cross Country Championships
Entebbe, Uganda, 3/22/14

Men's 10 km
Masaya Kakihara (3rd yr., Kanagawa University) - 28:33.50
Hiroshi Ichida (3rd yr., Daito Bunka University) - 28:53.98
Mitsunori Asaoka (3rd yr., Tokyo Nogyo University) - 29:16.89
Shota Baba (2nd yr., Komazawa Un…