japan running news

Qualification for the Jan. 1 New Year Ekiden corporate men's national championships got underway on the Nov. 3 holiday in Japan's most competitive region, East Japan, with the 58th East Japan Corporate Men's Ekiden Championships. Running without half marathon national record holder Yuta Shitara, 2015 winner Honda returned to the top with an exciting anchor stage win in 3:47:55 for the 7-stage, 77.5 km course.

The Hitachi Butsuryu team's leading man Yuki Muta got them off to a good start on the opening stage, but a 1-2 punch from DeNA's Kenta Murozuka and Bedan Karoki put DeNA 20 seconds ahead of the early leaders. 7th on the First Stage, Honda worked its way up to 3rd by the end of the Third Stage just a second behind Hitachi Butsuryu.

Honda moved into 2nd on the next stage, but its gap to leader DeNA stayed steady at 21 seconds. Fujitsu passed Hitachi Butsuryu for 3rd thanks to a stage win from Ken Yokote, and a new stage record of 22:52 for the 7.8 km Fifth Stag…

by Brett Larner

It's a great luxury to get to watch a live marathon broadcast with no commercials, but that's just what you get with the 70th edition of the Lake Biwa Mainichi Marathon this Sunday.  Japan's first IAAF gold label race, Biwako as it is called here features a live ad-free nationwide broadcast on NHK starting at 12:15 p.m. Japan time with the race kicking off at 12:30.  Overseas viewers can follow @JRNLive for live coverage throughout the race if NHK is not available in your area.

And what does the race hold?  It's the last of the selection races for the Japanese team for the Beijing World Championships.  At Tokyo last week the Federation seemed to have backed off its sub-2:06:30 requirement for auto team selection, with more talk about the top Japanese position in the selection races and deserving praise for the 2:07:39 scored in Tokyo by Masato Imai (Team Toyota Kyushu).  Imai is a clear favorite to make the team, with Fukuoka's top Japanese finisher…

by Brett Larner

The Lake Biwa Mainichi Marathon, universally called Biwako for short in Japan, celebrates its 70th running this year, with a place at the Beijing World Championships up for any Japanese man who decides to run sub-2:06:30.  For its anniversary year race Biwako brings back defending champion Bazu Worku (Ethiopia) and 2012 winner Samuel Ndungu (Kenya) to face the likes of 2:06 man Eric Ndiema (Kenya), Mongolian national record holder Ser-Od Bat-Ochir (Team NTN), 2:08:55 runner Jose Antonio Uribe (Mexico), 2014 European champion Daniele Meucci (Italy) and many more from around the world in one of the most international fields in Biwako history.

On the domestic front, with a 2:08:00 best Kazuhiro Maeda (Team Kyudenko), a rare Japanese athlete to have been at the top of the Japanese scene all the way from high school through a solid marathon career, goes in ranked #1 despite a weak 2014, twins Takayuki Matsumiya (Team Konica Minolta) and Yuko Matsumiya (Team Hitachi Butsuryu…