Tanimoto and Futaoka to Lead Japanese Marathon Team for Doha World Championships

The JAAF announced the lineups today for the Japanese women's and men's marathon teams for this fall's Doha World Championships. Having scheduled Japan's new MGC Race 2020 Olympic marathon trials event for two weeks before the World Championships the JAAF has specified that nobody can double, meaning that, including alternates, three of the four women and all four men named would have to give up a chance at being part of the Tokyo Olympics in order to get a guaranteed spot on a lesser national team.

That means a team drawn from the middle and lower end of the list of trials qualifiers, a good mix of relatively inexperienced younger athletes likely to develop further for the 2024 Paris Olympics, mid-career runners without much chance of making the top few spots at the trials, and aging veterans who've shrewdly sussed out that being on a national team is better for their brands than going for a higher-level one they know they can't make. It's a B-team to be sure, but given the depth in Japanese marathoning it's still one that almost any country except Ethiopia and Kenya would have a hard time matching.

Looking at performances within the MGC Race qualifying window, midsummer 2017 through the end of April this year, the top-ranked members of the Doha women's and men's teams are their youngest, Mizuki Tanimoto and Kohei Futaoka. Tanimoto, 24, ran 2:25:28 for 11th in Nagoya in March in just her third marathon, a performance that ranked her 9th among the fifteen women to qualify for the trials. Her corporate team Tenmaya has the best track record for putting people on national teams, and with two of its other runners with better PBs also qualified for the trials Tenmaya is opting for Doha for Tanimoto.

Futaoka, 25, ran 2:09:15 for 4th in Beppu-Oita in February in his second serious marathon, ranking him 11th among the 34 men on the trials list. His corporate sponsor Chudenko is one of the lower-tier corporate teams, and having him make a Worlds team is a major coup for them. Both Tanimoto and Futaoka have shown rapid progression so far, Tanimoto going from 2:35 to 2:31 to 2:25 and Futaoka from 2:13 to 2:09, and no doubt the powers that be are banking on them being contenders for the 2024 Paris Olympic team. The complete Doha team rosters with best performances inside the MGC Race qualifying window:

Women
Mizuki Tanimoto, 24 - 2:25:28, Nagoya Women's Marathon 2019 - 11th
Ayano Ikemitsu, 28 - 2:26:07, Nagoya Women's Marathon 2019 - 12th
Madoka Nakano, 27 - 2:27:39, Osaka International Women's Marathon 2019 - 4th
alternate: Yukari Abe, 27 - 2:28:02, Osaka International Women's Marathon 2019 - 5th (did not qualify for MGC Race)

Men
Kohei Futaoka, 25 - 2:09:15, Beppu-Oita Mainichi Marathon 2019 - 4th
Yuki Kawauchi, 32 - 2:09:21 - Lake Biwa Mainichi Marathon 2019 - 8th
Hiroki Yamagishi, 27 - 2:10:14 - Tokyo Marathon 2018 - 17th
alternate: Daiji Kawai, 27 - 2:10:50 - Lake Biwa Mainichi Marathon 2019 - 11th

© 2019 Brett Larner, all rights reserved

Federation Tells World Championships Marathoner Horibata To Go On Diet

http://hochi.yomiuri.co.jp/sports/etc/news/20110307-OHT1T00258.htm translated by Brett Larner Having made the 2011 World Championships marathon team by running a PB of 2:09:25 to come in 3rd overall and as the top Japanese finisher at the Mar. 6 Lake Biwa Mainichi Marathon, Hiroyuki Horibata (24, Team Asahi Kasei), talked to the media at Osaka Airport on Mar. 7. Following Sunday's race Rikuren director Keisuke Sawaki , 67, told Horibata, "Let's cut things down a bit until the World Championships," directing him to go on a diet. The 189 cm Horibata weighs 72 kg [~6'3", 160 lbs]. When he joined Team Asahi Kasei in 2005 at age 18 he weighed 65 kg, and this weight is still generally listed on his profile at races and in the media. "For some reason it never changes," he said with a grin. His coach Takeshi Soh , 58, commented, "If he was hungrier for glory his world would change completely," slapping the 'heavyweight division runner...

World Marathon Majors Japanese Entries

We're back from a short summer break. A week and a half out from the first race of the season's four World Marathon Majors races, here's a look at Japanese athletes scheduled to run. Everything right now is about qualifying for the MGC Race, the official trials race for the 2028 Los Angeles Olympics to be held in the fall of 2027 in Nagoya. The JAAF makes no mistake about wanting to keep its top people racing domestically where it can get a share of revenue from the TV broadcast and race operations, so anyone who decides to race overseas has to do it in a WA platinum label race and hit either 2:06:30 or 2:23:30, regardless of place, course or weather if they want to make the trials. At the same time concessions are make for domestic races, like for example the late-August Hokkaido Marathon where up to 3 men and 3 women can qualify if they go 2:12:00 or 2:32:00. As a result, you get things like last year where amateur runner Yudai Fukuda made the trials by finishing 3rd Jap...

Nakajima Breaks 100 mH NR Twice, Kitaguchi Returns - August Track Roundup

Catching up on what's been happening in track and field this month during our summer break: Men's 3000 m NR holder Nagiya Mori was just off his 5000 m PB at the IFAM Oordegem meet in Belgium on Aug. 1, taking 16th in 13:15.01. Shota Nakano was 26th of 28 in 13:35.02. This year's national champion Ryoma Aoki ran the 3000 mSC but didn't finish. Naoto Hasegawa was the only Japanese athlete at Mutaz Essa Barshim 's What Gravity Tour stop at the Monaco Athletics Festival meet on Aug. 5. Having cleared 2.30 m for the first time earlier this year Hasegawa only managed 2.18 m in Monaco, taking 7th of 10. There were a lot of good performances at the Fuji Hokuriku World Trial meet in Fujiyoshida on Aug. 9, but the one that got the headlines was a 12.62 (-0.2) NR in the women's 100 mH by Hitomi Nakajima . Nakajima actually did it twice, running 12.62 (+2.0) in the heats before repeating in the final. Masumi Aoki also ran big in the heats, with a 12.68 (+2.0) for al...

japan running news

Search This Blog