japan running news

Most of the weekend's focus was on the MGC Race 2020 Olympic marathon trials in Tokyo, but at the same time the National University Track and Field Championships were going on to the southwest in Gifu. The highlights of the meet were a pair of junior national records, one in the men's triple jump by Riku Ito (Kindai Kogyo Univ.) who jumped 16.34 m (+0.6 m/s) for the win, and another in the women's hammer throw by Momoko Watanabe (Tsukuba Univ.), whose 60.49 m throw was good for 2nd behind winner Miharu Kodate (Ryutsu Keizai Univ.).

The women's triple jump also saw a meet record, with winner Kanna Kawai (Osaka Seikei Univ.) jumping 13.65 m (+0.3 m/s). The highest-level race of the meet was probably the men's 4x100 m relay, where Tsukuba University led the top three under 39 seconds in 38.73.



88th National University Track and Field ChampionshipsNagaragawa Field, Gifu, Sept. 12-15, 2019
complete results

Men

100 m Final-0.0 m/s
1. Akihiro Higashida (Tsukuba Univ.) - 10.…

The IAAF World Relays in Yokohama were the weekend's main track action, but the first round of regional corporate championships and a few other meets brought distance action across the country.

The women's 10000 m was the highlight at the Kansai Region Corporate Championships, with Wacoal teammates Yuka Ando and Mao Ichiyama recovering from decent runs at the London Marathon last month to go 1st and 5th, Ando the fastest in 32:43.18. Their fellow MGC Race 2020 Olympic marathon trials qualifier Madoka Nakano (Noritz) was 2nd in 32:50.18, doubling the next day in the 5000 m where she was 5th in 16:07.24. Former Hakone Ekiden rivals and now teammates at NTT Nishi Nihon, Kenyans Patrick Wambui and Dominic Nyairo went 1-2 in the men's 10000 m in 28:41.84 and 28:43.86. Ryota Motegi (Sumitomo Denko) just missed the meet record in the men's 1500 m, winning in 3:44.12.

At the Chubu Region Corporate Championships Kenyans Rodgers Chumo Kwemoi (Aisan Kogyo) and Macharia Ndirangu …

by Brett Larner

Rio de Janeiro Olympics 3000 m steeplechase runner Anju Takamizawa, the first Japanese university woman to ever make an Olympic team in a distance event, led Matsuyama University to take down five-time defending national champion Ritsumeikan University and become the first school from the Chugoku-Shikoku Region to ever win the National University Women's Ekiden Championships title Sunday in Sendai.

【杜の都駅伝】
松山大学初優勝です！ pic.twitter.com/ftXf43wke1 — 日本学生陸上競技連合 (@iuauj) October 30, 2016
3rd last year, Matsuyama lined up against Ritsumeikan, Kanto Region champ and 2015 runner-up Daito Bunka University and 23 other teams at the Morinomiyako Ekiden, as Nationals are popularly called.  Ritsumeikan got off to a rocky start, its lead runner Nanako Kanno eight seconds behind 1500 m national university champion Natsu Hashimoto (Kyoto Sangyo Univ.) in 6th, but for Matsuyama and Daito Bunka the First Stage was a disaster. Matsuyama senior Ayumi Uehara, one of its three best runn…