Gosa Over Habtegebrel in Ethiopian Bahraini Duel at Saitama International Marathon

For the second year in a row Bahraini Shitaye Habtegebrel found herself knocked down to 2nd in the Saitama International Marathon's home straight, this time to fellow Ethiopian-born emigrant Dalila Gosa.

Part of a group of nine that immediately separated from the main body of the elite women-only race behind three pacers, both Gosa and Habtegebrel stayed at the front of the pack on mid-2:25 to low-2:26 pace as its five Japanese constituents and lone Ethiopian national Fatuma Sado dropped off one by one. When the last pacer stepped off at 30 km Habtegebrel and Gosa took turns leading in a successful effort to drop Kenyan Sylvia Kibet.

Last year Habtegebrel lost out to Flomena Cheych Daniel of Kenya by 3 seconds in the home straight, both of them ultimately having their times disallowed due to poor direction on the final corner. This time both Gosa and Habtegebrel successfully turned at the right spot thanks to improved course marking and marshaling, but Habtegebrel again lacked the closing speed to seal the win. Gosa took 1st in a PB of 2:25:35, Habtegebrel this time 4 seconds behind.

Kibet held on to 3rd in 2:28:38, exactly where the top Japanese woman needed to be to clear the 2:29:00 standard for qualification for Japan's 2020 Olympic marathon trials event, next September's MGC Race. It looked as though the last two Japanese women left in the pack, Marie Imada (Iwatani Sangyo) and Saki Tokoro (Kyocera) might be able to work together to stay under 2:29 pace, but when Tokoro fell off Imada began to lag. A rally from 30 to 35 km gave her a chance of clearing the qualification cutoff by about 30 seconds, but despite taking almost 2 1/2 minutes off her best Imada came up just short with a 2:29:35 for 4th.

London World Championships team member Mao Kiyota (Suzuki Hamamatsu AC) overtook Tokoro for 5th in 2:31:07, with Tokoro setting a new PB of 2:32:11 for 6th. Opting again this year to run the mass-participation race starting 30 minutes after the elite race after winning it three years in a row, local amateur Tomomi Sawahata (Sawahatters) took over 4 minutes off her best to win in a course record 2:35:58. Her time would have put her 9th in the elite race just behind the equally interesting Hiroko Yoshitomi (Memolead), who was 8th in the elite race in 2:34:47 in her fourth marathon in four weeks. There is a world of different motivations out there, and not everyone wants to follow the same dream.

With Saitama the elite-level Japanese women's marathon season pretty well comes to an end for 2018, the absolute last shot coming at the minor Hofu Yomiuri Marathon next weekend. The Japanese women's average of their ten fastest marathons of the year was 2:24:59, their best since 2005 and fourth-best ever. But with With Gosa and Habtegebrel's pair of times the Bahraini women's average for 2018 came to 2:24:37, surpassing the Japanese women for the first time. Bahrain ends the year ranked #3 behind the homelands of its athletes, Ethiopia and Kenya.

4th Saitama International Marathon

Saitama, 12/9/18
complete results

Elite Women - 9:10 a.m. start
1. Dalila Gosa (Bahrain) - 2:25:35 - PB
2. Shitaye Habtegebrel (Bahrain) - 2:25:39
3. Sylvia Jebiwot Kibet (Kenya) - 2:28:38
4. Marie Imada (Japan/Iwatani Sangyo) - 2:29:35 - PB
5. Mao Kiyota (Japan/Suzuki Hamamatsu AC) - 2:31:07
6. Saki Tokoro (Japan/Kyocera) - 2:32:11 - PB
7. Miharu Shimokado (Japan/Brooks) - 2:34:21
8. Hiroko Yoshitomi (Japan/Memolead) - 2:34:47
9. Yuko Mizuguchi (Japan/Denso) - 2:36:59
10. Asami Furuse (Kyocera) - 2:41:36
-----
DNF - Fatuma Sado (Ethiopia)

Mass-Participation Women - 9:40 a.m. start
1. Tomomi Sawahata (Sawahatters) - 2:35:58 - CR, PB

Mass-Participation Men - 9:40 a.m. start
1. Naoki Inoue - 2:20:03

© 2018 Brett Larner, all rights reserved

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...

japan running news

Search This Blog