The Ageo City Half Marathon is always big, the main race that the coaches of Hakone Ekiden-bound university men's teams use for firming up their entry rosters for the big show. That makes what's basically an idyllic small town race into one of the world's great road races, with depth unmatched anywhere. One of the top-tier people on the start list at 1:02:07, Kodai Miyaoka (Hosei Univ.) took the race out fast, but the entire pack was keying off the fastest man in the race, Reishi Yoshida (Chuo Gakuin Univ.), 1:00:31. Yoshida reeled Miyaoka in before 5 km and kept things steady in the low-1:01 range, wearing down the lead group to around 10 including his CGU teammate Taisei Ichikawa , a quartet from Izumo and National University Ekiden runner-up Komazawa University , 2 runners from local Daito Bunka University , 2:07:54 marathoner Atsumi Ashiwa (Honda), and Australian Ed Goddard . Right after 15 km Komazawa went into action, Yudai Kiyama , Hibiki Murakami and Haru Tanin
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I have just seen the news in The Guardian and I thought... OK Brett should have written something about it!
I think it is, finally, a sensible decision by the organisation, but it seems a mess to decide it now. What was the point of doing the Trials in the original course, then? And if volunteers and spectators have already arranged trips and accommodation mainly or even just to see the marathon? This is outrageous!!!
And there many other outdoor endurance events which will be dangerous because of heat and humidity. Are they going to move all of them to Sapporo? Ridiculous...
Anyway, neither Tokyo or Sapporo reaches the over 40C heat and the high humidity that the runners faced in Doha.
I was planning to visit Tokyo during the summer Olympics because even though I cannot afford tickets to other events I thought I could participate in cheering on the athletes in the marathon. With the marathon moving to Sapporo, I have cancelled my trip to Japan.
Hokkaido 2020 is better for doped athletes
because the harsh climatic conditions are more favorable for athletes "clean"