japan running news

Avoiding the worst of the typhoon that caused the season-opening national-level high school ekidens and other events to be canceled over the weekend, the National Sports Festival continued through Tuesday after day one and day two of athletics competition.

National junior records fell in the women's 5000 m racewalk, where Nanako Fujii (Edion) took 2nd overall in 21:24.40, and the junior men's 110 m hurdles, where Ko Tawada (Ogaki Shogyo H.S.) ran 13.31 (+1.5 m/s) for the win. Tawada also broke the meet record, one of four to be set over the final three days. Along with Tawada's mark, women's 5000 m racewalk winner Kumiko Okada (Bic Camera) set a new meet record of 21:08.97, Takumi Murashima (Fuji Pref. Sports Assoc.) set a senior men's 800 m meet record of 1:47.45, with his teammate Taio Kanai (Fukui Pref. Sports Assoc.) breaking the senior men's 110 m hurdles record in 13.46 (+1.2 m/s).



In distance action the highlight was the junior women's 3000 m, where…

The 2018 National Corporate Track and Field Championships continued Saturday at Osaka's Nagai Stadium with a pair of records to mark the day. On the women's side, Nanako Fujii (Edion) set a junior national record of 44:13.37 to finish 2nd in the 10000 m racewalk behind winner Kumiko Okada (Bic Camera). On the men's side, Takumi Murashima (Fukui Pref. Sports Assoc.)  took half a second off the previous 800 m meet record set by former national record holder Masato Yokota, winning in 1:47.97. 2nd and 3rd-placers Taichi Ichino (Roble) and Naoto Arayasu (Fujitsu) were also under Yokota's record, making the 800 m the race of the day.

In other noteworthy results, men's 20 km race walk world record Yusuke Suzuki (Fujitsu) returned from a six-month suspension for fudging expense claims to win the 10000 m race walk in 39:05.19.  Joel Mwaura (Kurosaki Harima) won the regular 10000 m in 27:45.31, leading the top five under 28 minutes. 2017 national XC champ Takashi Ichida (As…

6th in the men's pole vault two years ago, Masaki Ejima kept Japan's medal streak at the Tampere World U20 Championships alive with a bronze medal on the fifth day of competition. Both Ejima and silver medalist Zachery Bradford of the U.S.A. cleared 5.55 m on their third attempts and failed to clear 5.60, but as Ejima had struggled at 5.40 m the silver went to Bradford, who had cleared it with ease. Gold went to Armand Duplantis, who set a new championships record of 5.82 m.

A highly-anticipated medal failed to materialize in the men's 4x100 m, where the Japanese squad finished out of the medals by an agonizing 0.01 behind Germany, running in the top three throughout the race but outleaned at the line. Both the U.S.A. and Jamaica went under 39 seconds for gold and silver.  Another near-miss came in the women's 10000 m racewalk, where Nanako Fujii set a PB of 45:08.68 but came only 4th. In both the men's 10000 m racewalk and men's high jump Japan scored top eig…

Hosts Japan scored medals in five of the seven finals on the opening day of competition at the 18th Asian Junior Athletics Championships in Gifu. Following the withdrawal of teammate Rika Kaseda, Mikuni Yada was the only Japanese girl in the 5000 m but had no trouble scoring the gold medal, beating China's Li Hua Niu by 24 seconds to win in 16:31.65. Shumo Ozaki won Japan's other gold in the boys' pole vault by clearing 5.20 m for the first time.

It also took a PB for Nanako Fujii to win silver in the girls' 10000 m racewalk, finishing 4 seconds behind winner Li Ma of China 45:20.59 to 45:24.35. Likewise in the girls' shot put final, where Honoka Oyama threw a PB of 15.54 m for silver behind Chinese gold medalist Liu Ru Zhang's 16.05 m.

The day's lone Japanese bronze came in the boys' hammer throw, where Masanobu Hattori threw 69.34 m to make the podium alongside the powerful Indian duo of Ashish Jakhar and Damneet Singh. In the girls' hammer throw…