japan running news

Day Two results

2020 is the 100th anniversary of Japan's biggest sports event, the HakoneEkiden. Originally conceived of in large part by Japan's first Olympic marathoner Shiso Kanakuri as a way to develop Olympic marathon talent, this year's Hakone comes at the very start of the year the Olympics return to Tokyo. It also comes at the end of a season that saw four former Hakone stage winners take the top four spots at the 2020 Olympic marathon trials, validating Kanakuri's vision a century removed. But he could never have imagined the kind of race the kids would deliver.

Right from the gun the tone was set, with three-time First Stage winner Kazuya Nishiyama of last year's Day One winner Toyo University taking it out right on course record pace and the entire field going with it. The sheer aggression of the tone never changed over the entire five-stage, 107.5 km day, both big names and unknowns hitting it hard every stage. Minor school runner Rei Yonemitsu outran a…

Strong over the second half, it came down to an untried rookie just promoted up from the B-team to seal up the old-school Asahi Kasei team's fourth-straight New Year Ekiden corporate men's national championships title. Asahi Kasei was always there, 2nd on the opening stage thanks to a good run from leading man Keijiro Mogi, Kenyan Abraham Kapsis Kipyatich moving them up to 1st on the Second Stage in his final run with the team, and Sixth Stage specialist Hiroshi Ichida holding the lead on the Third Stage.

It wasn't until the Fourth Stage, at 22.4 km the longest of the day, that Asahi Kasei lost any ground, with 2019's fastest Japanese half marathoner Minato Oishi (Toyota) running down third man Hiroshi's twin brother Takashi Ichida and opening a gap of 12 seconds. On paper that should have been enough for Toyota, the favorite to end Asahi Kasei's domination, to pull it off, with Olympic marathon trials runner-up Yuma Hattori and the #2 and #3 half marathoners …

The Mount Fuji Women's Ekiden, the National University Women's Ekiden Championships Invitational, took place Dec. 30 in Shizuoka. 22 universities from across the country and two select teams competed for the national title in the midst of cold rain, with Nagoya's Meijo University covering the seven-stage, 43.4 km course in 2:23:09 to win for the second year in a row.

After a slow start that saw it sitting 3rd halfway through the race, Meijo's fourth runner Yuma Yamamoto ran a course record 13:55 for her 4.4 km stage to cut the defending champs' deficit way down. Meijo's next runner, 2019 World University Championships half marathon silver medalist Rika Kaseda, ran the fastest time for the race's longest stage to move the team up from 3rd to 1st. Sixth runner Narumi Kobayashi likewise won her stage on time to give Meijo a lead it kept all the way through the uphill anchor stage.

Meijo's win was both its second-straight and second ever and followed its w…

Australian Andrew Buchanan took over a minute and a half off his PB to win the third running of Tokyo's Year-End Half Marathon Dec. 29 in the western suburb of Tachikawa.

Conceived of as a race targeting university and corporate league men whose teams had missed out on qualifying for the New Year and Hakone Ekidens and for amateurs to get the chance to run alongside them, the Year-End Half Marathon covers four rolling laps of Showa Kinen Park, the same site used for the Hakone Ekiden Qualifier half marathon and National University Men's Half Marathon.

Buchanan ran as part of a lead group of five near 1:03-flat pace, with the group shaking down to four by 15 km. As Buchanan started to push over the final lap longtime leader Koga Matsuo (Josai Univ.) dropped off, leaving Shingo Moriyama (Yamanashi Gakuin Univ.) and Taiyo Iwasaki (Jobu Univ.) to compete for the win. Neither was up to the task, Buchanan kicking away for the win in 1:02:50 good enough to make him the fourth-fastes…

Championship ekiden week is here, four days of road relay action spread across five days from Dec. 30 to Jan. 3, all broadcast live to millions of fans across the nation.

Last year Nagoya's Meijo University beat five-time champ Ritsumeikan University to win the Mount Fuji Women's Ekiden, the National University Women's Ekiden Championships invitational, in course record time. This season Meijo looked pretty well unbeatable at the mid-season Morinomiyako Ekiden, beating runner-up Daito Bunka University by over two and a half minutes and Ritsumeikan by more than three over Morinomiyako's six-stage, 38.1 km course. Mount Fuji's is more demanding, seven hilly stages totaling 43.4 km through the foothills of Mount Fuji. Last year Meijo, Daito Bunka and Ritsumeikan finished within two and a half minutes of each other, and with Meijo looking even better this season it'll be hard for either of its main rival teams, or any others, to close that gap up. Watch the Mount …

Mao Ichiyama (Wacoal) and Yuta Shitara (Honda) topped JRN's 2019 Japanese distance rankings as the overall female and male athletes of the year despite neither succeeding in qualifying for the 2020 Tokyo Olympic team.

Just 21 years old, Ichiyama debuted at March's Tokyo Marathon in 2:24:33, then came back the next month with a 2:27:27 in London to qualify for the MGC Race Olympic marathon trials. En route to the MGC Race she won July's Hakodate Half Marathon in an all-time Japanese #8 time of 1:08:49 before taking the Olympic trials out at national record pace. She fell short of making the team, but after bouncing back in time for ekiden season she wrapped the year with a PB of 31:34.56 at December's National Corporate Time Trials meet.

Struggling with injury ever since his marathon national record at the 2018 Tokyo Marathon, Shitara returned with a 1:01:36 tuneup at April's Gifu Seiryu Half Marathon before dropping the fastest Japnaese 10000 m of the year, 27:53.6…

The New Year and Hakone Ekidens were big news among JRN readers as always. But in Japanese long distance, this year was all about the 2020 Olympic marathon, and especially about the Sept. 15 MGC Race, Japan's first modern attempt at a one-shot Olympic trials format for choosing its Olympic marathon lineup. Five of this year's ten most-read stories were about the MGC Race, its qualifying races, and about the Olympic marathon itself. The complete top ten stories of the year in Japanese distance as seen by JRN readers:

Tokai University Wins First-Ever Hakone Ekiden Title - Jan. 2-3
After Toyo University held off four-time defending champion Aoyama Gakuin Unviersity to lead the Hakone Ekiden at the end of its first day, Tokai University came on strong on Day Two to overtake Toyo and keep AGU at bay for its first-ever win at Japan's most prestigious race.

Nakamura and Maeda Win Japanese 2020 Olympic Marathon Trials - Sept. 15
Abandoning its black box multi-race national team sel…