japan running news

by Brett Larner

The Inter-University Athletic Union of Japan has released the entry lists for Sunday's National University Half Marathon Championships in western Tokyo's Showa Kinen Park. With the rapidly increasing level of Japanese university men's distance running the once-minor half marathon championships have taken on increasing importance, three of the last four years seeing winning times under 63 minutes and 2012's race setting world records for depth with 193 men under 66 minutes.  1389 men are entered for this year's race, and with a consistent pattern of large numbers running aggressive paces throughout the season since Tokyo secured the 2020 Olympics this year's race could be the fastest and deepest yet.

On Feb. 2 Hiroto Inoue (Yamanashi Gakuin Univ.) ran the fastest half marathon ever by a Japanese 21-year-old, 1:01:39, and with that time he heads the entry list.  Inoue is on the Japanese national team for the Mar. 29 World Half Marathon Championsh…

https://twitter.com/a_yamako/status/424296422305849344/photo/1

translated and edited by Brett Larner

The organizers of the 58th Kumanichi 30 km and 3rd Kumamoto-jo Marathon on Feb. 16 announced the 20 members of its 2014 elite field on Feb. 2.  Previously-announced Yuki Kawauchi (Saitama Pref. Gov't), has elected to run the marathon division rather than defend his course record win last year in the 30 km division, but the 30 km will focus on university athletes from the popular Hakone Ekiden, making it one of the freshest young fields in years.  From Hakone winner Toyo University come ace Yuma Hattori who took 3rd on Hakone's Second Stage, its most competitive, and Eighth Stage winner Ryu Takaku. Hakone runner-up Komazawa University sends two of its best men, team captain Shinobu Kubota and 2013 National University Half Marathon champion Shogo Nakamura.  3rd-place Nittai University sends top man Takumi Honda.  2012 National University Half Marathon winner Toshikatsu Ebina is a…

by Brett Larner

This weekend is the first of two for the biggest meet in Japanese university athletics, the Kanto Regional University Track and Field Championships. Thanks to the presence of the legendary Hakone Ekiden the Kanto region or KGRR is the center of Japanese university men’s distance running, and its regional championships are both deeper and higher-quality than the National meet where a limited number of KGRR schools compete with universally weaker schools from other parts of the country.

With a 27:38.31 by 21-year-old Waseda University senior Suguru Osako last month at the Payton Jordan Cardinal Invitational, sub-28 runs from identical twin Toyo University seniors Keita and Yuta Shitara, both 21, at last week’s Golden Games in Nobeoka and much more there has been a rush of activity by Japan’s 18-22 set recently. It’s time for an update of JRN’s ongoing comparison of the best of this group with their counterparts in the United States’ NCAA, a comparison to which addition…

by Brett Larner

The National University Men's Half Marathon Championships in Tokyo led three competitive Japanese half marathons this weekend.  Shogo Nakamura of 2012 National University Men's Ekiden winner Komazawa University outran defending champion Toshikatsu Ebina (Teikyo Univ.) for the win, 1:02:41 to 1:02:49 with the next three runners all going under 63 minutes for the first time.  All told, 38 collegiate men broke 64 minutes with 175 clearing 67.  The selection race for this summer's World University Games half marathon team, the overall fast day at the Championships ensured that Nakamura will lead a strong team this summer.  In post-race comments he said that his goal is the gold medal.

At the Kanaguri Hai Tamana Half Marathon in Kumamoto, 19-year-old Daichi Kato (Team Toyota Kyushu) handed Yuki Kawauchi (Saitama Pref. Gov't) his second loss of the year, keeping an eye on Kawauchi's water station surges and breaking away late in the race with a surge of h…

by Brett Larner

The end of the Japanese road season approaches with three big races on Sunday.  First is the last of the domestic selection races for Japan's World Championships marathon team, the Lake Biwa Mainichi Marathon.  With 2:05:13 man Vincent Kipruto (Kenya), 30 km world record holder Peter Kirui (Kenya) and 2012 Houston Marathon winner Tariku Jufar (Ethiopia) in the field Wilson Kipsang's 2:06:13 course record may be in reach, or at least the 2:06:50 winning time last weekend in Tokyo.  For the Japanese men the Federation has set a 2:07:59 hoop for a guaranteed place on the Moscow team, and the men have been jumping.  The main candidates for the team so far are:
Kazuhiro Maeda (Team Kyudenko) - 2:08:00 - PB (4th, Tokyo)Yuki Kawauchi (Saitama Pref.) - 2:08:15 - PB (1st, Beppu-Oita)Hiroyuki Horibata (Team Asahi Kasei) - 2:08:24 - PB (2nd, Fukuoka)Kentaro Nakamoto (Team Yasukawa Denki) - 2:08:35 - PB (2nd, Beppu-Oita) Given the recent upward trajectory in Japanese men…

by Brett Larner



It's almost time for Japan's biggest and best sports event, the Jan. 2-3 Hakone Ekiden, the Kanto region university men's championships.  It seems like every year I've come on here and said, "This is going to be the greatest Hakone ever," but it's true.  Things have been accelerating very rapidly in Kanto collegiate distance running.  There have been course records at Hakone the last two years, and this fall the other two Big Three University Ekidens, the Izumo Ekiden and National University Ekiden Championships, also saw course records.  Two years ago 15 athletes in Hakone's field had bests at the sub-13:40, sub-28:30 and sub-1:03:00 level.  Last year there were 19.  This year there are 32, from 15 of the 20 schools in the field.  Where is it going to end?  The battle between the three course record-setting schools this year, Toyo University, Komazawa University and Aoyama Gakuin University, looks set to be one for the ages.



Hakone th…

text and Kanto video by Brett Larner
Hachioji video by B1853264

Two major time trial meets focusing on the men's 10000 m took place in Tokyo Nov. 24, the pro-oriented Hachioji Long Distance Time Trials meet in Tokyo's western suburbs, and the Kanto Region University Long Distance Time Trials meet at the National Stadium.



The focus in the A-heat in Hachioji was on the 2013 World Championships A and B qualifying times of 27:40.00 and 28:05.00.  With impeccable pacing from Bitan Karoki (Kenya/Team S&B) in 14:00 through 5000 m, former Jobu University ace Yusuke Hasegawa (Team S&B), 2011 year-leader Tsuyoshi Ugachi (Team Konica Minolta) and Kenyans Patrick Mwaka (Team Aisan Kogyo) and Alex Mwangi (Team YKK) cleared the B-standard, Hasegawa going sub-60 on his final lap to deliver a 15-second PB of 27:50.64.  With outstanding conditions four other men in the top ten ran PBs of 20 to 45 seconds, led by 2012 Waseda University graduate Yusuke Mita (Team JR Higashi Nihon) in 28:…

by Brett Larner

At the second big race of the university ekiden season Nihon University senior Benjamin Gandu continued to develop into one of the hottest properties on Japanese soil, following his 1:01:06 best at February's Marugame Half Marathon with a 57:47 win at the Hakone Ekiden Yosenkai 20 km road race, the qualifying race for January's Hakone Ekiden for schools that fell outside the top ten at this year's Hakone.  With a nearly one and a half minute lead over the closest competition Gandu became the second-fastest man ever at the Yosenkai, leading Nihon University back to Hakone after the team's decades-long streak was broken last year.

With 2009 Yosenkai winner Akinobu Murasawa out with an Achilles injury Gandu easily broke his closest Kenyan competition, Duncan Muthee (Takushoku Univ.), with a surge at 10 km after the pair dueled their way through 14:22 and 28:40 opening 5 km splits.  Muthee in turn barely held off Keisuke Fujii (Chuo Gakuin Univ.), the only …

30th New Caledonia International Half Marathon
New Caledonia, 7/29/12
click here for complete results

Men
1. Yudai Yamakawa - 1:07:17
2. Toshikatsu Ebina - 1:08:02
3. Jun Aoki - 1:14:44

Women
1. Ayako Mitsui - 1:16:03
2. Maki Saito - 1:16:06
3. Kanade Iida - 1:17:18

by Brett Larner



Earlier this week JRN reported that based on Waseda University posting that one of its athletes had finished 211th at the Mar. 4 National University Men's Half-Marathon Championships in 1:06:11 it appeared that over 200 athletes may have broken 66 minutes for the first time ever.  With complete results available it is now evident that only 193 athletes, led by Teikyo University sophomore Toshikatsu Ebina in 1:02:23, broke 1:06.  This surpasses the previous world record of 188 set at the 2005 Ageo City Half Marathon but falls short of clearing the 200 mark.

JRN regrets the error.

2012 National University Men's Half-Marathon Championships
Tachikawa, Tokyo, 3/4/12
click here for complete results

1. Toshikatsu Ebina (Teikyo Univ.) - 1:02:23 - PB
2. Yudai Yamakawa (Teikyo Univ.) - 1:02:36 - PB
3. Takumi Honda (Nittai Univ.) - 1:02:37 - PB
4. Duncan Muthee (Kenya/Takushoku Univ.) - 1:02:40 - PB
5. Kenta Kitazawa (Takushoku Univ.) - 1:02:40 - PB
6. Kenta Chiba (Komazawa …

by Brett Larner
complete results coming soon

Three major half marathons across Japan started off the morning of Mar. 4 in style.  At the 63rd Kanaguri Hai Tamana Half Marathon, Komazawa University graduate Takuya Fukatsu (Team Asahi Kasei) ran a solo 1:01:25 course record, the all-time #8 Japanese mark on an unaided course and bettering the 1:01:31 mark set by Fukatsu's former Komazawa teammate Yusuke Takabayashi (Team Toyota) last month at Marugame.  Fukatsu ran together with Kenyans Kiragu Njuguna (Daiichi Kogyo Univ.) and Dishawn Karukuwa Maina (Team Aisan Kogyo) before dropping them in the second half of the race to win by over a minute.  Hiroko Miyauchi (Team Kyocera) won the women's 10 km in 33:09, with Shuhei Kondo (Oita Tomei H.S.) winning the high school boys' 10 km in 29:38.

At the Shizuoka Sunpu Half Marathon, Shinichi Yamashita (Takigahara SDF Base) won in a conservative 1:04:58 over Teikyo University's Katsunori Watanabe and Takuma Tamura, but the race was …

by Brett Larner
photos by Daniel Seite



One of three current teams coached by members of Waseda University's record-setting mid-90's team, Jobu University pulled off a surprise win at this year's Hakone Ekiden Qualifier, a 20 km road race in and around Tokyo's Showa Kinen Park that determines the second tier of teams to join the ten already seeded for January's main event.  The youngest team in the field, under head coach Katsuhiko Hanada Jobu has developed a heavy emphasis on overall quality and team running rather than relying on individual aces, a trait that served has served it well in the past and was again the key to its success this year.  Ranked only 5th coming into the race Jobu ran consistently, outside the top ten for the first half, 5th at 15 km, and on top by the end.  It was one of only two schools to put two runners into the top ten, one of them courtesy of a very nice run from first-year Shun Sato.  By contrast, top-ranked Josai University, coached b…