Skip to main content

Sendai to Go Ahead With Planned Expansion of Sendai International Half Marathon

http://sportsnavi.yahoo.co.jp/other/athletic/headlines/20110726-00000035-kyodo_sp-spo.html

translated by Brett Larner

At a press conference in Sendai on July 26, organizers of the 22nd Sendai International Half Marathon announced that they will go ahead with plans to expand the event from 1000 elite and semi-elite runners to a mass-participation race with a field limit of 10000 at next year's race, scheduled for May 13.  According to city officials, Sendai will become the largest half marathon in Japan, with a new course that takes in the best of Sendai's downtown area.

The new event will combine the elite Sendai International Half Marathon with the amateur-level Sendai City Marathon held in the fall and will include the full range of participants from those trying for a spot on the Japanese national team for the World Half Marathon Championships to recreational runners trying to break 2 hours 30 minutes.  The new race will also include a wheelchair race along with 2 km and 5 km events.  Applications open on October 3, with a lottery planned should the number of applications exceed the maximum field size.

The 21st edition of the Sendai International Half Marathon was scheduled for May this year but was cancelled after March's major earthquake and tsunami hit the Sendai area.  Sendai mayor Emiko Okuyama commented, "I hope this event will help contribute a new sense of the attraction of the rebuilding, re-emerging Sendai."

Comments

Most-Read This Week

'Kobe 2024: Aitchison, Athmani Lead Record-Breaking Thursday'

  https://www.paralympic.org/news/kobe-2024-para-athletics-world-championships-aitchison-athmani-lead-record-breaking-thursday Complete results and daily schedule from the Kobe World Para Athletics Championships are here .

Osako Breaks Marathon NR for 3rd Time - Weekend Roundup

It looked like it was going to be a big weekend, and it delivered. For the 3rd time in his career Suguru Osako broke the men's marathon NR, running 1 second under the standing record to take 4th in the Valencia Marathon in 2:04:55. All the way to 40 km he was steady on 2:58/km, 2:05:10 pace, and like a surprising number of other people in both the men's and women's races, there was a massive jump over the last 2.195 km from his projected finish time to his actual one. His run put Osako back on top of the Japanese charts, put the average of Japan's 10 fastest marathon times of the year under 2:06 for the first time, and got him into the L.A. Olympics marathon trials. Valencia has been trying to get top-tier Japanese athletes to come for years, and now that they finally managed to do it it paid off in a big way. Expect more next year. Back home, former Takushoku University captain Derese Workneh won a 3-way race against Toyota teammates Kazuya Nishiyama and Bedan Ka...

'Kobe 2024: Monday Sees Shocking Wins on the Track and the Field'

  https://www.paralympic.org/news/kobe-2024-para-athletics-world-championships-monday-sees-shocking-wins-track-and-field Complete results and daily schedule from the Kobe World Para Athletics Championships  are here .