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Takei Breaks Gold Coast Marathon CR in Dominant Japanese Run

Japanese men showed up in force at the 45th ASICS Gold Coast Marathon Sunday in Australia, taking the top 6 spots and 8 of the top 10 led by a 2:07:33 course record by Yuki Takei . Expert pacing by World Marathon Majors-bound Tsubasa Ichiyama and Masato Arao kept things on track to break the 2:07:40 CR by 30 seconds until Arao stepped off at 30 km, a 30 km that saw at least two falls, one by 2:08:40 runner Ryoma Takeuchi at 23 km and another by debuting 61-minute half marathoner Tatsuya Tsunashima at 27 km. In Tsunashima's case it was enough to knock him out of the race when he hit his head on the pavement, send to the hospital post-race for examination. When Arao stepped off former Aoyama Gakuin University ekiden specialist Aoi Ota went straight to the front, looking to make up for a stellar and predictable DNF at this year's Tokyo Marathon in prep for Berlin by getting an easy finish under his belt. Right on him was Yuki Takei , 2:08:06 in Osaka the week before Tokyo. ...
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National Track and Field Championships Highlights

Japan's National Championships happened Friday through Sunday at Tokyo's National Stadium, the same track where September's World Championships will take place. The biggest result of the weekend came in the women's 800 m, where high schooler Rin Kubo cleaned up the mess caused last when she became the first Japanese woman under 2 minutes but did it at a JAAF-sanctioned time trial meet that hadn't been registered to the World Athletics calendar. In Saturday's final she bettered that time with a 1:59.52, making it a national record that WA will actually recognize. The only other record set came in the women's 5000 m on Friday, where NR holder Nozomi Tanaka set a meet record 14:59.02 to win a competitive race over Ririka Hironaka , 2nd in 15:12.61, and Kana Mizumoto , 3rd in a big PB of 15:13.19. Tanaka doubled back in the 1500 m Sunday, duly winning in 4:04.16. Veteran Tomoka Kimura ran a PB of 4:09.88 for 2nd, giving a big boost to her chances of making i...
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