japan running news

Moroccan Soud Kanbouchia took the top spot in Japan's second-biggest marathon Sunday, breaking the Osaka Marathon women's course record to win in 2:31:19.

In the early going Kanbouchia had company from minor team corporate leaguers Hiroko Yoshitomi (Memolead) and Kasumi Yoshida (Nitori) on mid-2:27 pace, but with a surge at halfway she was on her own and stayed that way until the finish. Yoshitomi, this year's Boston Marathon 10th-place finisher who set a PB and CR of 2:30:09 two weeks ago at the Fukuoka Marathon and, incredibly, won the Ohtwara Marathon on Friday in 2:37:22, dropped off after 10 km to settle into mid-2:30s pace. Yoshida lasted longer but slowed dramatically after 25 km and was quickly retaken by Yoshitomi.

But from the main pack of amateur women behind them club runner Haruka Yamaguchi (AC Kita) emerged to run both down, running almost even splits to take 2nd in 2:34:12, a PB by over 4 minutes. Yoshitomi hung on 3rd in 2:34:39, almost 3 minutes faster th…

Hey, guess what, it's another busy weekend in Japan. 50% busier what with it being a long weekend. Here's what's up:

Friday the great Paul Tanui (Kyudenko) leads the show in the Time Trial in Nagasaki track meet, one of the few top-level Japan-based Kenyans not headed to Tokyo for the weekend. Speaking of Tokyo, also Friday is the Fuchu Tamagawa Half Marathon, once the top-level autumn half for university men but fallen on harder times. A few runners from local Komazawa University usually still line up in Fuchu.

Everyone but Tanui is headed to western Tokyo for Saturday's Hachioji Long Distance meet, one of the world's premier 10000 m races every year and site of the current Japanese national record. The man who set it, Kota Murayama (Asahi Kasei) is one of two Japanese men entered in the A-heat, the other being 5000 m and marathon national record holder Suguru Osako (NOP). Murayama will be going for a time under the yet-to-be-announced Doha World Championships st…

One of the world's ten biggest marathons with nearly 30,000 finishers, his year's Osaka Marathon takes place Nov. 25. At the elite level Osaka has carved an interesting place for itself as a sort of unofficial amateur Japanese women's national championships, with just about all of Japan's sub-2:40 amateur women entered. 2017 winner Yumiko Kinoshita (Tokyo T&F Assoc.) leads 6 of last year's top 7 including Mitsuko Ino (Linkstyle), who finished just 1 second behind Kinoshita in the last edition, and 2016 Osaka winner Yoshiko Sakamoto (F.O.R.). But they have serious competition ahead of them this time in the form of quasi-corporate leaguer Hiroko Yoshitomi (Memolead), fresh from a 2:30:09 PB and CR win at the Nov. 11 Fukuoka Marathon, and 2:31:09 Moroccan Soud Kanbouchia. First-timer Felista Wambui (Kenya) is a wildcard. The high-volume racer Yoshitomi is the heavy favorite, the only question really being whether she can finally break 2:30 for the first time.

The…

Amateur winners of two of the world's biggest marathons, 2016 Osaka Marathon champ Yoshiko Sakamoto (YWC) and 2018 Boston Marathon winner Yuki Kawauchi (Saitama Pref. Gov't) return to Sweden to run the Stockholm Marathon for the second year in a row this Saturday with support from JRN. For its 40th running Stockholm features a new course designed to cut most of the hills out of the first half of the race, but with temperatures expected to peak at 27C the quality elite field may not be able to take full advantage of the new configuration.

5th last year, Sakamoto is fresh off a 2:35:40 PB at February's Tokyo Marathon. She faces defending champion Konjit Tilahun Biruk (Ethiopia), seven-time winner Isabellah Andersson (Sweden) and #1-ranked Kumeshi Sichala (Ethiopia), the only woman in the field with a current sub-2:30 time. The 2:28:24 event record set way back in 1988 by the great Grete Waitz (Norway) will be a stretch, but however fast it goes Sakamoto hopes to at least ma…

#1-ranked Kaleab Ghilagabr became the first Eritrean winner in the Osaka Marathon's short seven-year history, leading 29,359 finishers across the line Sunday in a PB 2:12:03, while club runner Yumiko Kinoshita (SWAC) had to run a minute-plus PB 2:34:38 to win an exciting battle between Japan's six best amateur women by 1 second.

Ghilagabr set off accompanied by unsponsored amateur Hideyuki Ikegami, an unusual independent who got attention by beating Yuki Kawauchi in a half marathon in 2014 and went on to be mentored by 2:07:48 Olympian Arata Fujiwara. In April this year Ikegami made his marathon debut at the Hannover Marathon but finished in a disappointing 2:30:15 that didn't reflect the quality suggested by his 1:03:09 half best and 1:31:53 PB for 30 km. 
The pair ran 2:10:30 pace through 15 km, PB pace for both, before Ikegami began to slip. Ghilagabr pushed on alone, holding on to 2:10 pace until well into the second half before beginning to slow. Ikegami was caught b…

It's always a busy weekend of racing in Japan, this weekend as much as any. Saturday's main event is the Hachioji Long Distance meet at Tokyo's Hosei University. In the last few years Hachioji has become one of the world's premier track 10,000 m, the site of the current Japanese national record two years ago. The big question mark this year is half marathon national record holder Yuta Shitara (Honda) in the A-heat. After running the 1:00:17 national record and a 2:09:03 PB on back-to-back weekends at the end of September is he ready to tackle the 27:29.69 national record? It'll take a big improvement on his 27:42.71 best, but not as much as what he did in breaking the half marathon record.

Also up Saturday night is the Kanto Region University 10,000 m Time Trials meet at Kanagawa's Keio University. While the very top university men will turn up at Hachioji, most looking to sharpen their times ahead of their coaches' final team selections for the Hakone Eki…

One of the world's ten biggest marathons, in its six runnings to date the Osaka Marathon has continued to avoid the addition of a world-class elite field of the same caliber as at equivalently-sized races like Tokyo, Berlin and Boston. In place of doling out cash to pros, Osaka's women's field has developed into a sort of national championship race for amateur women.

In the field this year are six, probably all six, of the amateur Japan women to have broken 2:40 in the last three years. Last year's top three, Yoshiko Sakamoto (F.O.R.), Yumiko Kinoshita (SWAC) and Hisae Yoshimatsu (Shunan City Hall) lead the way at the 2:36 +/- level, with a second trio of Marie Imada (Iwatani Sangyo), Mitsuko Ino (R2 Nishin Nihon) and Chika Tawara (RxL) all around the 2:39 level.

Last year's winner Sakamoto and 3rd placer Yoshimatsu squared off in September at Germany's Volksbank Muenster Marathon, Yoshimatsu tying Sakamoto's Osaka winning time of 2:36:02 to take 3rd over …

by Brett Larner

One of the ten biggest marathons in the world, the Osaka Marathon celebrated its first-ever Japanese winner this year.

第六回大阪マラソン　女子の部優勝
坂本喜子選手

浪速区敷津
Canon EOS 1D X
Canon EF 70-200mm 1:2.8L IS Ⅱ USM#写真好きな人と繋がりたい#大阪マラソンpic.twitter.com/5Zmd3Mm6bU — KKMMM (@KkmmmGurkha) October 30, 2016
The Osaka women's race was a one-woman show the whole way.  Amateur runner Yoshiko Sakamoto (Y.W.C.) a 37-year-old mother of three and former high school star who took up marathons at age 32 after not running for more than 10 years, went it alone from the gun.  35 seconds ahead of #1-ranked Nurit Yimam (Ethiopia) at 5 km, Sakamoto fearlessly pushed her pace under 2:30 by 15 km and stretched her lead to almost four minutes as Yimam and top club runner Yumiko Kinoshita (SWAC) held steady to 2:35~36 pace.  With a best of 2:36:29 Sakamoto was bound to pay for it, and after halfway she began to slow.  "After 33 km it felt like my right hamstring was going to cramp up," she told JRN …

http://www.yomiuri.co.jp/sports/etc/20151025-OYT1T50034.html

translated by Brett Larner

Daniel Kosgei (Kenya) won the fifth running of the Osaka Marathon on Sunday, running 2:13:46 for the 42.195 km course.  Taiga Ito (Suzuki Hamamatsu AC) was 2nd in 2:15:32.  In the women's race, Maryna Damantsevich (Belarus) won in a 2:32:28 course record with Hisae Yoshimatsu (Shunan City Hall) 2nd in 2:37:48.  Temperatures were 19 degrees Celsius with 39% humidity and 1.3 m/s easterly winds.

5th Osaka Marathon
Osaka, 10/25/15
click here for top results

Men
1. Daniel Kosgei (Kenya) - 2:13:46
2. Taiga Ito (Suzuki Hamamatsu AC) - 2:15:32
3. Ser-Od Bat-Ochir (Mongolia/Team NTN) - 2:15:35
4. Sho Matsumoto (Team Nikkei Business) - 2:16:28
5. Yuko Matsumiya (Team Hitachi Butsuryu) - 2:16:40

Women
1. Maryna Damantsevich (Belarus) - 2:32:28 - CR
2. Hisae Yoshimatsu (Shunan City Hall) - 2:37:48
3. Yumiko Kinoshita (Second Wind AC) - 2:38:17
4. Chika Tawara (Kyushu E-Runners) - 2:39:44
5. Yoshiko Sakamoto (Mie …

http://www.nikkansports.com/sports/athletics/news/f-sp-tp0-20150210-1432840.html

translated and edited by Brett Larner

On Feb. 10 the Osaka Marathon organizing committee announced that its fifth running will take place on Oct. 25.  The full marathon field size will be increased by 2000 to a record-setting 30,000, with runners in the 8.8 km Challenge Run bringing the total number of participants to 32,000.

The increase in the marathon field is made up of 1000 places reserved for people who applied unsuccessfully for the third and fourth runnings, and another 1000 for "Citizen Athletes" who have run specific qualifying times. 

Applications will open on the official race website in April.  If the number of applicants exceeds the field limit entry will take place via lottery.  145,000 people applied for last year's race.  For more information call the Osaka Marathon call center at 06-6445-3978 beginning Feb. 19.

Translator's note: Last year with an official field size of …