japan running news

by Brett Larner photos and video by Ekiden News 優勝東洋大学！ #全日本大学駅伝 pic.twitter.com/01s67HXnpv — EKIDEN News (@EKIDEN_News) November 1, 2015 "You never know unless you try."  #4-ranked Toyo University outran all expectations, even their own, to take down heavy favorite Aoyama Gakuin University in a thrilling head-to-head battle over almost the entire 8-stage, 106.8 km course to win its first-ever National University Men's Ekiden Championships title. At a public talk event last week Hiroaki Oyagi , head coach of four-time defending national champ Komazawa University grudgingly paid tribute to the fresh green Aoyama Gakuin uniform, saying, "We'd like to win a fifth title, but this year everything's gone green."  For his part, popular young Toyo head coach Toshiyuki Sakai , famed for transforming Toyo into the team that redefined the Hakone Ekiden, said simply, "You never know unless you try."  And try Toyo did. From the first leg,...

by Brett Larner videos by Ekiden News Two months after his 3rd-place finish on the Hakone Ekiden's most competitive stage helped put Aoyama Gakuin University in position for the overall win and a month after running a 1:02:09 PB at the Marugame Half, 20-year-old AGU second-year Tadashi Isshiki scored his first national title with a 1:02:11 win at the 18th National University Men's Half Marathon Championships in Tokyo's Showa Kinen Park.  After record-setting depth last year when a world record 207 men broke 1:06:00 the National University Half blew minds again this year, the top 12 all breaking 1:02:30 and 27 collegiate men going under 1:03:00.  With perfect conditions today the field excelled, completely rewriting the record books as 265 men went under 1:06:00. With places on the Japanese team for this summer's World University Games half marathon for the top three finishers and a bigger dream hovering in the distance 5 1/2 years away the massive pack wen...

by Brett Larner While the corporate leagues take a breather after their regional track and field championships last week , Kanto-area university runners are bracing for the second weekend of Japan's best track meet, the Kanto Regional University Track and Field Championships  at Yokohama's Nissan Stadium. The men's 800 m should be highlights of the meet,  Nihon University  senior Sho Kawamoto  having set a national record of 1:45.75 two weeks ago at the Golden Grand Prix Tokyo meet in Tokyo's National Stadium.  His second-year teammate Jun Mitake  is the next-best runner in the field with a 1:48.67 PB, so while another NR is probably too much to ask between the two of them they should have a good chance of taking the 1:48.06 meet record set in 2009 by Kenyan Daniel Gitau , another Nihon University runner. It says a lot about the quality of Kanto university men's distance running that four of the five Japanese men in this week's ARRS world top 200 ran...

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 wh...

by Brett Larner With Japan's fiscal and academic year wrapping up at the end of March the majority of the country's corporate runners are in a holding pattern until track season gets underway in April.  Collegiate runners dominate what's left of the season, with Sunday's National University Women's Half Marathon Championships, held in conjunction with the Matsue Ladies' Half Marathon and 10 km , marking the last major domestic race of the season. Winning times at the National Championships have been in the 71-minute range the last few years.  The lack of a World University Games this year could bring down that leading edge, but if the record-setting depth at last week's National University Men's Half Marathon Championships was any indication the women's race should still be deeply competitive. 2013 Ageo City Half Marathon winner Takashi Ichida  (Daito Bunka University) and 2013 National University Track and Field Championships 1500 m winner Ikut...

by Brett Larner 19-year-old Nittai University second-year Hideto Yamanaka  lived up to his superb 2014 Hakone Ekiden First Stage win today in Tokyo's Showa Kinen Park, taking nearly five minutes off his half marathon best to win the National University Half Marathon Championships in a course record 1:02:09.  Despite cold temperatures and on-and-off rain, Yamanaka led aggressively from the start before getting away in the final kilometers to win by more than twenty seconds over Waseda University's Daiki Taguchi  and Koki Ido  and Komazawa University's Yoshihiro Nishizawa  and Shota Baba . The momentum of Yamanaka and the others in the front pack pulled the entire field along, all of the top ten going sub-63, nine of them in PB times.  For the first time in history more than 200 men cleared 66 minutes in a single half marathon, a new world record  which confirmed the upward trend in Japanese university men's performances that has only increased s...

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 ...

by Brett Larner Komazawa University 　rode the momentum of its course record win at last month's Izumo Ekiden to score its third-straight and eleventh total national title Nov. 3 at the 45th National University Men's Ekiden Championships .  2013 national university half marathon champion Shogo Nakamura  blew things open on the 14.6 km First Stage by opening a gap of over 30 seconds that never closed.  Five of Komazawa's eight runners scored stage bests to seal the deal, anchor and captain Shinobu Kubota  falling just short of breaking last year's overall course record of 5:12:43 for the full 106.8 km distance as he crossed the line in 5:13:09. By far the star of the show was Komazawa junior Kenta Murayama .  Let's say that again. Kenta Murayama .  Remember that name.   Kenta Murayama .  After crushing Japanese domestic 10000 m record holder Tsuyoshi Ugachi 's stage record at Izumo last month, Murayama did the inconceivable and ran 39:24 to t...

by Brett Larner video by akuy125 Domestic Japanese action this weekend focused on the annual National Sports Festival and on three competitive half marathons.  Women's 5000 m Japanese year leader Misaki Onishi  (Team Sekisui Kagaku) started the weekend off with a win in 15:43.03 in a close pack race at the National Sports Festival 5000 m.  2013 World University Games 10000 m gold medalist Ayuko Suzuki  (Nagoya Univ.) was next across the line in 15:46.30, with 3rd through 9th all finishing within less than two seconds of her.  Kenyan Charles Ndungu (Sapporo Yamanote H.S.) had an easier time in the junior men's 5000 m, winning by nearly 20 seconds in 13:56.27 over  Suguru Hirosue (Kobayashi H.S.). Course record holder Mekubo Mogusu  (Kenya/Team Nissin Shokuhin) enjoyed an even greater level of domination in winning his third Ichinoseki International Half Marathon , improving on his time last year in clocking 1:02:11.  Runner-up Yuta Koyama ...

http://www.chugoku-np.co.jp/News/Tn201301280004.html http://www.komaspo.com/4210 http://mainichi.jp/area/saitama/news/20130128ddlk11050143000c.html http://www.nikkansports.com/sports/athletics/news/f-sp-tp0-20130127-1077441.html http://hochi.yomiuri.co.jp/sports/etc/news/20130127-OHT1T00214.htm translated and edited by Brett Larner Three late-season ekidens took place this weekend.  Amid light snow in Yamaguchi, 48 teams took part in the 76th running of the Chugoku Yamaguchi Ekiden on a 7-stage, 84.4 km course from Ube City Hall to Shunan City Hall.  In the elite division, after an exciting Sixth Stage that saw 2012 Fukuoka International Marathon winner Joseph Gitau (Kenya/Team JFE Steel) cover the 15.9 km stage in 46:11 to move his team up into 1st, Team Chugoku Denryoku retook the lead on the anchor stage and claimed its eleventh Chugoku Yamaguchi title and first in two years in a time of 4:06:44.   Saikyo High School 's A team won the high school division in ...

Story on African-born Bahraini athletes dominating senior races here: http://www.iaaf.org/news/newsid=64449.html 12th Asian Cross Country Championships Quingzhen, China, 3/24/12 results via @athletekuma Senior Men's 12 km 1. Alemu Bekele (Bahrain) - 35:33 2. Dejene Regassa (Bahrain) - 35:39 3. Bilisuma Shume (Bahrain) - 35:41 4. Hasan Mahboob Ali (Bahrain) - 36:18 ----- 6. Hayato Saito (Team Honda) - 36:59 7. Yu Mitsuya (Team Toyota Kyushu) - 37:06 8. Daichi Motomura (Tokai Univ.) - 37:13 10. Hiroyoshi Umegae (Team NTN) - 37:44 Senior Women's 8 km 1. Shitaye Eshete (Bahrain) - 26:14 2. Tejitu Daba (Bahrain) - 26:50 3. Genzebe Shami (Bahrain) - 26:59 4. Hitomi Niiya (Sakura AC) - 27:03 ----- 8. Sachi Tanaka (Sports Yamagata 21 AC) - 27:53 10. Ayuko Suzuki (Nagoya Univ.) - 28:35 11. Toshika Tamura (Matsuyama Univ.) - 28:54 Junior Men's 8 km 1. Shota Baba (Kurashiki H.S.) - 25:07 2. Yudai Yamamoto (Suma Gakuen H.S.) - 25:10 3. Taiga Machizawa (Kas...

by Brett Larner Along with marathoner Yuki Kawauchi 's anchor stage win at the Okumusashi Ekiden , three other ekidens around the country on Sunday saw significant action. At the biggest of them, the 75th Chugoku Yamaguchi Ekiden, Team Mazda  had a surprise upset over local stronghold Team Chugoku Denryoku  thanks to a spectacular anchor run from ace Akihiko Tsumurai .  Starting the 11.1 km Seventh Stage 43 seconds behind Chugoku Denryoku anchor Takumi Kiyotani , Tsumurai ran him down and won by three seconds, with Mazda finishing in 4:11:49 for the seven-stage, 84.4 km course to Chugoku Denryoku's 4:11:52.  Tsumurai clocked a new stage record of 31:21, a flat conversion to 28:07 for a road 10 km, just two seconds off   the national record held by Chugoku Denryoku's Atsushi Sato .  2011 national champion Sera H.S.  was a surprise 3rd in 4:14:13, one second ahead of the pro Team Sagawa Express  thanks to a sizeable lead from opening Kenyan John...