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Showing posts with the label Tomoe Yokoyama

Keizo Yamada Completes Final Boston Marathon

by Brett Larner

81 year-old Keizo Yamada, the 1953 Boston Marathon winner, returned to this year's race on Apr. 20. Yamada successfully finished his 18th Boston in 6:16:56 after a first half of 2:33:29. Universal Sports reports that Yamada intends this year's running to be his last.

A laughably slow women's race gave Team Toto's Tomoe Yokoyama and amateur runner Hiroko Sho some unexpected international camera exposure as they ran at the head of the elite women's pack in the earliest stages of the race. Yokoyama had suffered injuries since winning February's Ome Marathon 30 km road race and hoped only to break 2:40, meaning that the lead pack's speed throughout the first 10 km of the race suited her fine. As the pace crept glacially forward Sho drifted away, but Yokoyama moved to the front and alternated the lead with veteran American Colleen de Reuck. Only nearing halfway, for which Yokoyama clocked 1:19:59, did she begin to lose contact, eventually fading to…

A Comeback Victory for Yokoyama in Ome

http://hochi.yomiuri.co.jp/sports/etc/news/20090216-OHT1T00040.htm

translated by Brett Larner

At the 43rd Ome Marathon on Feb. 15, Tomoe Yokoyama (32, Team Toto) won the women's 30 km race in 1:47:01 six years after her previous Ome victory in 2003. Now completely recovered from a right leg injury which sidelined her career for years, Yokoyama is enthusiastically looking forward to running the marathon in the 2012 London Olympics.

Running under a picture-perfect blue sky, Yokoyama left her competitors far behind as she broke the goal tape, exhibiting in her comeback Ome victory the kind of running not seen since her long-ago first win in 2003. "I'm really grateful to everyone who's helped me up 'til now," she commented afterwards. "And my confidence to race is back." Wearing the laurel wreath for the first time in six years as she stood upon the highest point of the podium, Yokoyama's smile transmitted her joy to all.

The period between her wins has…

Kurosaki, Yokoyama and Yamauchi Take Ome Marathon Wins

by Brett Larner

While the 2008 Ome Marathon 30 km and 10 km road race was cancelled due to heavy snowfall, this year's race saw unseasonable mid-spring temperatures around 20 degrees. 23280 people ran the two races, with 17959 in the 30 km race and 5321 in the 10 km.

Team Konica Minolta's first-year star recruit Hirokatsu Kurosaki continued to impress, taking the win in the men's 30 km division in 1:32:50, a strong time on Ome's famously hilly course. Veteran jitsugyodan runner Kurao Umeki (Team Chugoku Denryoku) was 48 seconds back in 2nd, narrowly beating out Waseda University's downhill specialist Sota Kato who ran a PB of 1:33:52 for 3rd. 2009 World Championships marathon team member Satoshi Irifune (Team Kanebo) was 4th in 1:34:17, just half a step ahead of American Nicholas Arciniaga who clocked the same time but was 5th.

The women's 30 km race was a three-way battle, with Tomoe Yokoyama (Team Toto) winning in 1:47:01 over Team Hokuren's Yoshie Kitomi a…