Skip to main content

Murayama, Otsu and Tanaka to Run New York City Half Marathon

by Brett Larner

The organizers of the Mar. 17 New York City Half Marathon have released the men's and women's elite fields for this year's race.  Alongside world-level medalists including Wilson Kipsang (Kenya), Dathan Ritzenhein (U.S.A.), Deressa Chimsa (Ethiopia), Meb Keflezighi (U.S.A.) and Bernard Lagat (U.S.A.), Japanese collegiates Kenta Murayama (Komazawa Univ.) and Kento Otsu (Toyo Univ.) will be running as part of a relationship organized by JRN between the New York City Half Marathon and the Ageo City Half Marathon.  Murayama, the first man to win the National University Championships 5000 m as a first-year since the great Toshihiko Seko, won Ageo in 1:02:46 last November before going on to run an all-time Japanese #10 1:01:19 at February's Marugame Half Marathon, a time that would have put him 4th in New York in 2012.  Otsu, 2nd at Ageo in 1:02:53, is running New York for the second time after making his international debut there last year.

2013 Marugame women's runner-up Kim Smith (New Zealand) heads the women's field, where her competition includes Sendai Ikuei H.S. graduate Caroline Rotich (Kenya), 2012 National Corporate Half Marathon champion Tomomi Tanaka (Team Daiichi Seimei), Olympians Valeria Straneo (Italy), Sabrina Mockenhaupt (Germany) and Madai Perez (Mexico), and a half-dozen or so competitive Americans.  The race is scheduled to be streamed live online on www.7online.com starting at 7:00 a.m. local time, 8:00 p.m. Japan time.

2013 New York City Half Marathon Elite Field
New York, 3/17/13

Men
Wilson Kipsang (Kenya) - 58:59
Dathan Ritzenhein (U.S.A.) - 1:00:00
Abdi Abdirahman (U.S.A.) - 1:00:29
Julius Arile (Kenya) - 1:00:31
Tesfaye Girma (Ethiopia) - 1:00:36
Deressa Chimsa (Ethiopia) - 1:00:51
Meb Keflezighi (U.S.A.) - 1:01:00
Sam Chelanga (Kenya) - 1:01:19
Kenta Murayama (Japan/Komazawa Univ.) - 1:01:19
Kevin Chelimo (Kenya) - 1:01:21
Juan Luis Barrios (Mexico) - 1:01:48
Hafid Chani (Morocco) - 1:02:23
Daniele Meucci (Italy) - 1:02:30
Kento Otsu (Japan/Toyo Univ.) - 1:02:43
Ketema Nigusse (Ethiopia) - 1:02:59
Bado Worku (Ethiopia) - 1:02:59
Stephen Sambu (Kenya) - 1:03:02
Tesfaye Assefa (Ethiopia) - 1:03:13
Rob Watson (Canada) - 1:03:29
Jason Hartmann (U.S.A.) - 1:03:32
Odilon Cuahutle (Mexico) - 1:03:59
Guor Marial (U.S.A.) - 1:04:21
Bouabdellah Tahri (France) - 1:06:12
Leonard Korir (Kenya) - debut
Bernard Lagat (U.S.A.) - debut

Women
Kim Smith (New Zealand) - 1:07:11
Valeria Straneo (Italy) - 1:07:46
Sabrina Mockenhaupt (Germany) - 1:08:45
Caroline Rotich (Kenya) - 1:08:52
Madai Perez (Mexico) - 1:09:45
Tomomi Tanaka (Japan/Team Daiichi Seimei) - 1:09:47
Janet Bawcom (U.S.A.) - 1:09:55
Adriana Nelson (U.S.A.) - 1:09:57
Serena Burla (U.S.A.) - 1:10:08
Sara Moreira (Portugal) - 1:10:08
Lisa Stublic (Croatia) - 1:10:31
Susan Partridge (Great Britain) - 1:10:32
Bekelech Bedada (Ethiopia) - 1:10:54
Diane Nukuri Johnson (Brazil) - 1:10:55
Maegan Krifchin (U.S.A.) - 1:10:56
Aziza Aliyu (Ethiopia) - 1:11:07
Malika Mejdoub (Morocco) - 1:11:33
Lindsey Scherf (U.S.A.) - 1:11:45
Mary Davies (New Zealand) - 1:11:49
Claire Hallissey (Great Britain) - 1:12:02
Stephanie Rothstein (U.S.A.) - 1:12:19
Freya Ross (Great Britain) - 1:12:23
Yolanda Caballero (Colombia) - 1:12:35
Adriana Da Silva (Brazil) - 1:13:16
Lyudmila Kovalenko (Ukraine) - 1:13:35
Hirut Beyene (Ethiopia) - 1:14:39
Adrienne Herzog (Netherlands) - debut

(c) 2013 Brett Larner
all rights reserved

Comments

Most-Read This Week

Waseda Leads Top 7 Teams Under Izumo Ekiden CR, Ivy League Best-Ever 3rd (updated)

3rd last year, Waseda University scored its first Izumo Ekiden win since 2010, taking almost 2 minutes off the CR and leading the top 7 teams under the old record of 2:07:51 for the complete 6-stage, 45.1 km course. Waseda was 16 seconds back in 7th after the First Stage, but its 2nd runner Ojiro Honda made that up easily and put them 6 seconds out front. A massive 22:56 CR for the 8.5 km Third Stage by Shadrack Kipkemei (Nihon Univ.) dropped Waseda back to 2nd even though its runner Ryuki Suzuki broke the old CR too, but back-to-back CR on the next 2 stages by 1st-year Haruki Niizuma and Shunpei Yamaguchi put anchor Shinsaku Kudo out of reach of the rest of the field. Kudo duly won the 10.2 km anchor stage in 29:00, bypassing a 2:06 time entirely for a new 2:05:56 CR, just under 2:48/km average pace for the complete course. Defending champ Koku Gakuin University struggled a bit in the first half of the race but came on strong in the longer second half with 4th and 5th runners...

Kipyegon Repeats, Toyo Wins Hakone Ekiden Qualifier in First Appearance in 21 Years

Back for the first time in 21 years after a disastrous 14th-place finish at the 102nd Hakone Ekiden this past January, Toyo University hit one out of western Tokyo's Showa Kinen Park with a solid win at the Hakone Ekiden Yosenkai, the half marathon that serves as the official qualifying race for the 103rd Hakone Ekiden. The top 10 teams in the Hakone auto-qualify for the following year, with the rest having to run the Yosenkai in October with a squad of 10 to 16 runners out of which the top 10 score on aggregate time, with the 10 fastest schools joining the Hakone field and top individuals from non-qualifying teams names to the Kanto Region Student Alliance select team to make up the complete Hakone field of 21. Driven in large part by an aggressive run from 3rd-year Yu Miyazaki , one of only 2 Japanese athletes to go with the big African contingent up front, Toyo won in 10:31:30, 1:03:09 or 2:59.6/km per athlete. As the first team to have broken the 3:00/km average pace barrie...

Ngetich and Mutiso Take Down Tokyo Legacy Half CR

In its 5th edition the Tokyo Legacy Half Marathon scored 2 new course records via Kenyans from the Ikaika agency, with 10 km WR holder Agnes Ngetich blasting 3 minutes off the old record to win by over 4 in 1:04:23, and Alexander Mutiso skimming just 1 second under the CR for the win by 5 seconds in 59:51. The 2 races played out completely differently, even if the paydays were the same for the winners. Surrounded by an envelope of male runners all the way to the final 100 m, Ngetich was out hard on the downhill in the first 5 km, hitting it on sub-64 pace in 15:08 before leveling out on the flat middle 10 km. Her next 2 splits projected to 1:04:09 and 1:04:17, and even with the uphill back to the stadium in the last 5 km she didn't fall far off from that, winning in 1:04:23. Runner-up Tabitha Njeri Kamau was nearly a mile back in 1:08:28, with Kamau's Mitsui Sumitomo Kaijo teammate Kazuna Kanetomo dropping a 1:10:17 PB for 3rd. Now an independent, track Olympian Kaede Ha...