Skip to main content

Kiprotich and Barsosio Break Sydney Marathon Course Records, Sasaki and Yamaguchi 3rd and 4th

Despite warm and windy conditions the Blackmores Sydney Marathon saw new course records in both its men's and women's races. Felix Kiprotich (Kenya) led the way in the men's race with the first-ever sub-2:10 clocking on Sydney's challengingly hilly and twisting course, breaking away from a group including Michael Kunyuga (Kenya) and Satoru Sasaki (Asahi Kasei) for the win in 2:09:49.

The top three all broke the course record. Sasaki, a Rio Olympian in the marathon who failed to qualify for today's MGC Race 2020 Olympic trials, could take extra satisfaction from having been 26 seconds faster than MGC winner Shogo Nakamura (Fujitsu) on a far tougher course. "I was aiming to win," Sasaki told JRN post-race, "but the course was really twisty and it was hard to run. It would have been nice to be a bit faster, but given my current situation and the problems I've had since Lake Biwa last year I think this put me back on my feet and will help me in my next race. Thanks for cheering for me. It was fun."

In the women's race a lead quartet of Africans took it out on track to go five minutes under the course record, almost fast enough to challenge Naoko Takahashi's 2:23:14 Australian all-comers record from the 2000 Sydney Marathon. The pace burned the group down, leaving only Kenyan Stellah Barsosio out front with a male pacer. Barsosio slowed slightly on the infinite twists and turns of the course's last 10 km but was still strong enough to take almost four minute off the course record in 2:24:33. Barsosio's time was so good that runner-up Josephine Chepkoech (Kenya) was almost two minutes under the course record despite being over two minutes behind. Ethiopian-born 3rd-placer Tejitu Chalshissa (Bahrain) just missed the record with a 2:28:22.

Three weeks after likewise just missing the course record at the New Caledonia Marathon, amateur runner Haruka Yamaguchi (AC Kita) was in Sydney in pursuit of her first sub-2:30 clocking with support from JRN. Moving up from 7th to 5th and spending most of the race there on her own, Yamaguchi went through halfway in 1:13:52. Over the second half she moved up to 4th, but the endless sharp turns in the last 10 km wore her down and she faded to a 2:33:09. That was still a PB by over 30 seconds, but it left Yamaguchi disappointed. "I made it to the end safely" she said post-race. "It was a PB but not the kind of time I was shooting for. I have to try again."

Blackmores Sydney Marathon

Sydney, Australia, 9/15/19
complete results

Men
1. Felix Kiprotich (Kenya) - 2:09:49 - CR
2. Michael Kunyuga (Kenya) - 2:10:05 (CR)
3. Satoru Sasaki (Japan/Asahi Kasei) - 2:11:02 (CR)
4. Elijah Kemboi (Kenya) - 2:12:55
5. Silas Too (Kenya) - 2:13:49

Women
1. Stellah Barsosio (Kenya) - 2:24:33 - CR
2. Josephine Chepkoech (Kenya) - 2:26:43 (CR)
3. Tejitu Chalchissa (Bahrain) - 2:28:22
4. Haruka Yamaguchi (Japan/AC Kita) - 2:33:09 - PB
5. Alice Mason (New Zealand) - 2:38:35

© 2019 Brett Larner, all rights reserved

Buy Me A Coffee
Labels:

Comments

Post a Comment

Most-Read This Week

Hakone Champ AGU Hits 50 km a Day in Spring Break Training Camp

Having scored its 3rd-straight Hakone Ekiden win this past January, Aoyama Gakuin University spent the Golden Week spring holidays training on the Myoko Plateau in Niigata from May 2-6. Along with the champion men's ekiden team, the first 2 members of AGU's new women's long distance team Nodoka Ashida and Kairi Ikeno , and AGU alumni and 2026 New Year Ekiden champion GMO team members Yuya Yoshida and Asahi Kuroda also took part in the training camp. Depending on the day's training schedule, mileage at the camp was over 50 km a day. AGU men's captain Kaito Nakamura confidently said, "This Golden Week training camp is where we lay the foundations for our 4th-straight Hakone title." A lot of people spend Golden Week on vacation, but the AGU ekiden team spent their time working hard on Myoko's rolling land amid the sprouting leaves of spring. On the 2nd day of the camp, May 3, team members woke up at 5:00 a.m. to do their warmup. The team assembled a...
1 comment
Read more

Everything You Need to Know About the 2026 Hakone Ekiden

The Hakone Ekiden is the world's biggest road race, 2 days of road relay action with Japan's 20 best university teams racing 10 half marathon-scale legs from central Tokyo to the mountains east of Mount Fuji and back. The level just keeps going higher and higher , hitting the point this year where there are teams with 10-runner averages of 13:33.10 for 5000 m, 27:55.98 for 10000 m, and 1:01:20 for the half marathon. It's never been better, and with great weather in the forecast it's safe to say this could be one of the best races in Hakone's 102-year history, especially on Day One. If you've seen it then you know NTV's live broadcast is the best sports broadcast in the world, with the pre-race show kicking off at 7:00 a.m. Japan time on the 2nd and 3rd and the race starting at 8:00 a.m. sharp. If you've got a VPN you should be able to watch it on TVer starting at 7:50 a.m. on the 2nd , and again at 7:50 a.m. on the 3rd . There's even a 2-hour high...
3 comments
Read more

70th Yamagata-ken Judan Ekiden

The 70th running of the Yamagata-ken Judan Ekiden happened over the start of the Golden Week holidays, a 3-day, 29-leg race covering 306.9 km around the northern prefecture of Yamagata. There used to be a lot more of these races where people from the prefecture run for their hometown teams on a Tour de Whatever prefecture or area it happens to be held in, but Yamagata's is one of the few to have survived this long. And amazingly enough, local broadcaster YBC live streamed the entire thing on Youtube. There aren't many corporate teams in the mostly rural area, so runners from the ND Software corporate team played a heavy role, its 2 best runners Masato Arao and Ryoma Takeuchi winning their stages on Day 2 with Takeuchi doubling to anchor the Kita-Murayama team to an overall 5th-place finish, and Koichi Shoji breaking the 2nd leg CR on Day 1 and winning the 2nd-to-last stage on Day 3 to play a key role in the Yamagata city team taking the overall win in 16:06:51, 3:09/km ...
1 comment
Read more