Skip to main content

Reiko Tosa to Appear At Matsue Ladies Half Marathon

http://www.sanin-chuo.co.jp/sports/modules/news/article.php?storyid=499933094

translated by Brett Larner

On Feb. 6 the organizing committee of the 29th Matsue Ladies Half Marathon released the names of the invited field for this year's event. Appearing at the race is Reiko Tosa (Team Mitsui Sumitomo Kaijo), who will be running the women's marathon at this summer's Beijing Olympics. The winner of January's Osaka International Women's Marathon, Mara Yamauchi (Second Wind AC; U.K.), and 2nd place finisher in the 2006 Tokyo International Women's Marathon Akemi Ozaki (Second Wind AC) are also entered. Yamauchi and Ozaki will be racing in the half marathon, while Tosa will be appearing as a guest runner in the girls' 10 km event.

The race will take place in Matsue on Mar. 16 in front of Matsue Castle and includes 4 events: a nationally-certified official half marathon and 10 km, a 10 km for girls aged 16 or older, a 2.5 km elementary school girls' and boys' race, and a childrens' 1 km.

Yamauchi was 2nd in last year's half marathon. She recorded a PB of 2:25:10 in the Osaka International Women's Marathon and will be representing the U.K. at this summer's Beijing Olympics. Tosa is appearing in Matsue for the 4th straight year after qualifying for the Beijing Olympics by winning a bronze medal at last summer's World Championships. Ozaki was 4th at last year's Tokyo International Women's Marathon.

This year's race is also the 11th Japan Student Women's Half Marathon championships. 2 runners from Matsue will be competing. Entry for any of the events is open until Feb. 15. For more information please call race headquarters at 0852-22-7607.

Translator's note: Reiko Tosa has still not raced since qualifying for the Beijing Olympics last summer. She suffered health problems throughout the fall, but has a history of recovering from setbacks in time for major events.

Comments

Most-Read This Week

Australian YouTuber Handed Lifetime Ban by Ageo City Half Marathon After Running 1:06 with Another Runner's Bib (updated)

After discussion with their race's chief JAAF referee, on Nov. 27 the organizers of the Ageo City Half Marathon handed down a lifetime ban from their event against 36-year-old Australian Matt Inglis Fox  for running the Nov. 15 race wearing the bib number of another JAAF-registered runner. The incident came to light after Fox posted on his personal Instagram account that he had run a PB of 1:06:33 and finished 203rd in Ageo with a 10 km split of 31:03, along with photos and video of himself in the race wearing a bib number beginning with 11. Fox did not appear in the results by name or in that time or place, the closest match being a 1:06:54 gross, 1:06:50 net finish time with a 31:21 10 km split for 18th place in the JAAF-registered division and 209th overall by bib number 1129, registered to a non-Japanese Tokyo-resident club runner. The club runner, Harrisson Uk , readily confirmed that he had given his bib to Fox, saying, "I gave my number to Matt. It wasn't me."...

How it Happened

Ancient History I went to Wesleyan University, where the legend of four-time Boston Marathon champ and Wes alum Bill Rodgers hung heavy over the cross-country team. Inspired by Koichi Morishita and Young-Cho Hwang’s duel at the 1992 Barcelona Olympics I ran my first marathon in 1993, qualifying for Boston ’94 where Bill was kind enough to sign a star-struck 20-year-old me’s bib number at the expo. Three years later I moved to Japan for grad school, and through a long string of coincidences I came across a teenaged kid named Yuki Kawauchi down at my neighborhood track. I never imagined he’d become what he is, but right from the start there was just something different about him. After his 2:08:37 breakthrough at the 2011 Tokyo Marathon he called me up and asked me to help him get into races abroad. He’d finished 3rd on the brutal downhill Sixth Stage at the Hakone Ekiden, and given how he’d run the hills in the last 6 km at Tokyo ’11 I thought he’d do well at Boston or New York. “I...

Nat'l University Ekiden Updates Here

Looks like I just went over my update limit on Twitter - sorry, it's the first time I've tried to use it for this. I'll look for another option next time. In the meantime I'll add updates to the comments below. Not sure if that has a max too but I guess we'll find out. Update: Part one of the Nationals commentary can be found here .