Know Your Japanese Runners in Boston

The withdrawal of Kentaro Nakamoto (Yasukawa Denki), Japan's best championship marathoner of the modern era, from the Boston Marathon field with a stress fracture is a blow to what would have been the best Japanese contingent in Boston in decades.

Yuki Kawauchi (Saitama Pref. Gov't) leads the way, arriving in Boston off wins in his last four marathons:

2:10:03, Hofu Yomiuri Marathon, 12/17/17
2:18:59 CR, Marshfield New Year's Day Marathon, 1/1/18
2:11:46 CR, Kitakyushu Marathon, 2/18/18
2:14:12, Wan Jin Shi Marathon, 3/18/18

Kawauchi hopes to at least equal Suguru Osako's top 3 placing in last year's Boston, his optimism growing as the weather forecast gets worse.

Naoki Okamoto (Chugoku Denryoku) runs for what was once Japan's most successful corporate team in the marathon, his best of 2:12:31 coming 6 years ago at Lake Biwa and his fastest recent time a 2:13:33 in Tokyo last year. Okamoto earned a place in Boston by winning February's tough and hilly Ome 30 km in 1:33:09.

A high-volume marathoner like Kawauchi, Kansuke Morihashi (Raffine) won January's Katsuta Marathon in 2:16:51 to earn an invite to Boston. A month later he followed up with a PB of 2:14:25 at the Tokyo Marathon, jogging the Seoul Marathon three weeks after that in a fun run effort.

Topping the women's side is another idiosyncratic high-volume marathoner, Hiroko Yoshitomi (Memolead). Yoshitomi won the hilly Katsuta Marathon in January in 2:33:56, the second-fastest winning time in event history, then came back a week later to smash the Beppu-Oita Mainichi Marathon course record with a 2:33:00 win. A week after that she took 9th in the National Corporate Half Marathon Championships in 1:13:58. Two weeks later in Tokyo she ran 2:30:16 for 6th, cutting over a minute off her five-year-old PB. Three weeks after that, a 2:33:57 win in her hometown Saga Sakura Marathon.

Ome women's winner Maki Ashi (Kyudenko) rounds out the Japanese lineup in her marathon debut at age 24. A 1:11:12 half marathoner, Ashi ran 1:44:14 in Ome to seal up a trip to Boston. Interestingly, joining her in Boston as her coach is the just-retired Kazuhiro Maeda, a longtime rival of Kawauchi's who was part of the 2013 Moscow World Championships team alongside both Kawauchi and Nakamoto.

All-time Boston Marathon Japanese Men's Top Ten

2:09:27 - Toshihiko Seko, 1st, 1981
2:10:13 - Toshihiko Seko, 2nd, 1979
2:10:28 - Suguru Osako, 3rd, 2017
2:11:02 - Hiromi Taniguchi, 4th, 1993
2:11:32 - Kenjiro Jitsui, 6th, 2006
2:11:50 - Toshihiko Seko, 1st, 1987
2:13:15 - Takayuki Inubushi, 10th, 1998
2:13:40 - Tomoyuki Taniguchi, 5th, 1987
2:13:49 - Yoshiaki Unetani, 1st, 1969
2:13:55 - Akinori Kuramata, 11th, 1998

All-time Boston Marathon Japanese Women's Top Ten

2:24:11 - Reiko Tosa, 3rd, 2006
2:26:26 - Yoshiko Yamamoto, 2nd, 1992
2:26:39 - Yuko Arimori, 3rd, 1999
2:26:52 - Kiyoko Shimahara, 5th, 2006
2:29:24 - Nobuko Fujimura, 3rd, 1996
2:30:34 - Mitsuko Hirose, 8th, 1999
2:30:40 - Yurika Nakamura, 6th, 2010
2:31:12 - Junko Asari, 6th, 1997
2:31:31 - Kaori Tanabe, 10th, 2001
2:31:39 - Yoshiko Yamamoto, 6th, 1995

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...

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...

Route Inn Hotels Win National Corporate Women's Ekiden Qualifier for First Time

After Saturday's Hakone Ekiden Yosenkai qualifying race in Tokyo, 2nd-tier corporate women's teams were in Fukuoka for their own national championships qualifying race, the Princess Ekiden . With Queens Ekiden 19-placer Otsuka Seiyaku a DNS, 30 teams lined up for the 6-stage, 42.195 km race where the top 16 would go on to join the top 8 from last year's Queens Ekiden at next month's national race. Coming right in the middle of the international fall marathon season several teams had people still tired from Berlin and Chicago, with Daihatsu fielding Rika Kaseda and Natsuki Omori from Berlin, Tokyo Metro sending out its own Berlin duo of Mao Uesugi and Ayumi Morita , and Kraftia not playing its top member Yuka Akasaki after her solid run in Chicago last week. After a fast start from eventual 9th-placer Denso 's Rio Matsutani , Daihatsu took over on the Second Stage and held it until the Fifth, where a tired Omori dropped to 3rd. Mayuka Fujita from Route Inn H...

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