Mekuria and Tefera Bring Osaka Into the Game With Course Record Wins

The Fukuoka International Marathon is the traditional major player on Japan's December marathon calendar, but resting on traditional can only last so long. The Osaka Marathon, one of the world's ten largest mass-participation marathons, this year got into the elite game in a big way with its best-ever fields and a race date that put it head-to-head with Fukuoka.

Bidding to get into the IAAF/World Athletics road race label game, Osaka brought in enough quality internationals to keep its mostly amateur domestic field off the eight-deep podium. Aberu Mekuria (Ethiopia) dominated the women's race with a 2:26:29 course record, more than two minutes ahead of Kenyan mercenary runner-up Monica Jepkoech (Bahrain). 2017 Osaka winner Yumiko Kinoshita (Japan) ran the second-fastest time of her career, 2:35:16, but finished off the podium in 9th.

The men's race must have had the Fukuoka organizers sweating, as Ethiopian Asefa Tefera dropped a 2:07:47 course record for the win, like Mekuria winning by about two minutes. Tefera's time ended up being 37 seconds slower than Fukuoka winner El Mahjoub Dazza's, but while only one other man went sub-2:10 in Fukuoka, here three more did, Moroccans Mohamed El Aaraby and Mohamed Ziani, and Ethiopian Husen Muhammed Amin Esmael.

Osaka flexing its muscle to get into the elite end of Japanese marathoning seems like a natural move given the event's position as one of the world's biggest marathons. But where does it leave the other traditional elite Japanese races? If Osaka stays on this date it's hard to see it not hitting Fukuoka pretty hard. With a high-level women's race it's also hard not to see that impacting January's Osaka International Women's Marathon. And what about next weekend's Saitama International Marathon, where only one semi-elite Japanese woman is set to start?

The logical sequence of events would be to take the elite women's race out of Saitama, leaving it as a nice amateur mass-participation race, and put the elite race back in Tokyo where it belongs. September's MGC Race showed that Japan's rival TV broadcasters can cooperate to cover both the women's and men's races in a single marathon. Do the same for Tokyo and give its women's race the coverage it deserves and has never gotten. With December freed up, take the Osaka International Women's Marathon race and stage it as part of the Osaka Marathon. Move Fukuoka to Osaka International's date at the end of January, eliminating the problem with Japanese corporate league men not being able to run Fukuoka because of the New Year Ekiden four weeks later. Voila, all domestic calendar problems solved. All that remains then is how to keep them relevant against Valencia, Dubai, and the other races coming up all around.

Osaka Marathon

Osaka, 12/1/19

Women
1. Aberu Mekuria (Ethiopia) - 2:26:29 - CR
2. Monica Jepkoech (Bahrain) - 2:28:37
3. Soud Kanbouchia (Morocco) - 2:28:56
4. Veronica Nyaruai (Kenya) - 2:29:03
5. Maryna Damantsevich (Belarus) - 2:31:58
6. Clementine Mukandanga (Rwanda) - 2:32:45
7. Joan Jepchirchir (Kenya) - 2:32:59
8. Olha Kotovska (Ukraine) - 2:33:55
9. Yumiko Kinoshita (Japan) - 2:35:16
10. Mitsuko Ino (Japan) - 2:39:04

Men
1. Asefa Tefera (Ethiopia) - 2:07:47 - CR
2. Mohamed El Aaraby (Morocco) - 2:09:31
3. Mohamed Ziani (Morocco) - 2:09:44
4. Husen Muhammed Amin Esmael (Ethiopia) - 2:09:53
5. Duncan Maiyo (Kenya) - 2:11:43
6 Ketema Bekele Negasa (Ethiopia) - 2:12:09
7. Berhane Tsegay Tekle (Eritrea) - 2:12:44
8. Gizachew Hailu (Ethiopia) - 2:14:06

© 2019 Brett Larner, all rights reserved

19-Yr-Old Munakata Breaks Miura's U20 NR to Win Ageo City Half Marathon

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

Ageo City Half Marathon Preview and Streaming

This weekend's big race is the Ageo City Half Marathon , the next stop on the collegiate men's circuit. Most of the universities bound for the Jan. 2-3 Hakone Ekiden use Ageo to thin down the list of contenders for their final Hakone rosters, and with JRN's development program that sends the first two Japanese collegiate finishers in Ageo to the United Airlines NYC Half every year a lot of coaches put in some of their A-listers too. That gives Ageo legendary depth and fast front-end speed, with a 1:00:47 course record last year from Kenyan corporate leaguer Paul Kuira (JR Higashi Nihon) and the top 26 all clearing 63 minutes. Since a lot of programs just enter everybody on their rosters you never really know who on the entry list is actually going to show up, but if even a quarter of the people at the top end of this year's list run it'll be a great race, even if conditions are looking likely to be a bit warmer than ideal. Chuo Gakuin University 's Reishi Yoshi

10000 m NR Attempt In the Works Saturday at Hachioji Long Distance - Streaming and Preview

There are a bunch of other time trial meets this weekend and next, but Saturday's Hachioji Long Distance is the last big meet for Japanese men, 8 heats of Wavelight-paced 10000 m finely graded from target times of 28:50 down to 26:59 for the fastest heat. Heat 6 at 17:55 local time is effectively the B-race, with 35 Japan-based Kenyans targeting 27:10 at the front end, and in a lot of cases a spot on their teams at the New Year Ekiden national championship on Jan. 1. Corporate teams are only allowed to field one non-Japanese athlete in the New Year Ekiden, and only on its shortest stage, and getting to that has a big impact on African athletes' contracts and renewal prospects. Toyota Boshoku , Yasukawa Denki , Chugoku Denryoku , Aisan Kogyo , JR Higashi Nihon , Subaru and 2024 national champion Toyota are all fielding two Kenyans, and Aichi Seiko three. For people like Toyota's Felix Korir and Samuel Kibathi , getting as close to the 27:10 target time as they can and

japan running news

Search This Blog