Karasawa Breaks T11 5000 m World Record

Karasawa Breaks T11 5000 m World Record - Weekend Track Roundup

Four out of five corporate regional championship meets went off as schedule this weekend, with the 51st Hokuriku Region meet in Ishikawa the only one to cancel amid the latest COVID-19 wave hitting Japan.

The 63rd East Japan Region meet in Saitama was the biggest and fastest of those that did happen. The biggest news was in the T11-T13 men's 5000 m, where T11-class Kenya Karasawa (GSWC) won in 15:09.94, going a second and a half under the previous world record for his class. Sitonki Kiprono (Komori Corp.) turned in the only sub-28 men's 10000 m of the weekend, winning Saturday's A-heat in 27:47.69. Justus Soget (Honda) was likewise the only one to go sub-3:40 for 1500 m, winning Saturday's A-heat in 3:39:12. Soget doubled to win Sunday's men's 5000 m A-heat in 13:29.43 going close to 55 seconds for the final lap and ending up the only man under 13:30 for the weekend.

Pauline Kamulu (Route Inn Hotels) won the East Japan women's 10000 m in 32:15.27 on Saturday. Tabitha Njeri Kamau (Mitsui Sumitomo Kaijo) won Sunday's 5000 m A-heat in 15:17.94 in a close race that saw the top four finish within less than 0.9 seconds of each other. Ririka Hironaka (Japan Post) set a meet record 8:56.65 to win the 3000 m A-heat, the fastest 3000 m of the weekend. Cynthia Mbaire (Hitachi) won the 1500 m A-heat in 4:13.45, leading Naomi Muthoni Kariuki (Univ. Ent.) and Chikako Mori (Sekisui Kagaku) under 4:15. Mori doubled Sunday in the 3000 mSC, running a 9:50.67 meet record for the win.

At the 65th Chubu Region meet in Gifu, Rodgers Chumo Kwemoi (Aisan Kogyo) took the men's 10000 m A-heat in 28:09.99 by almost 10 seconds. His teammates Philemon Kiplagat and Kosei Yamaguchi went 1-2 in Saturday's 3000 mSC, Kiplagat in a meet record 8:26.50, then did it again in Sunday's 5000 m, Kiplagat running 13:31.10 and Yamaguchi 13:31.24. Kazuki Kawamura (Toenec) won the 1500 m A-heat in 3:42.67.

The women's races were mostly low-key, with Naoko Koizumi (Denso) winning the 10000 m in 34:06.71 and Momoka Kawaguchi (Toyota Jidoshokki) the 5000 m in 15:45.63. Kawaguchi's teammates Nozomi Tanaka and Yume Goto won the 3000 m and 1500 m in 8:58.54 and 4:14.29, with Ayano Ikeuchi (Denso) soloing a 10:21.79 meet record to win the 3000 mSC.

At the 65th Kansai Region meet in Osaka, two weeks after securing her place on the Tokyo Olympics 10000 m squad Yuka Ando (Wacoal) won the distance double, taking Friday's 10000 m in 31:58.55 and Sunday's 5000 m in 15:30.30. Olympic marathoner Mao Ichiyama (Wacoal) was 3rd in the 10000 m and 2nd in the 5000 m just a week and a half after running a PB 1:08:28 to win the Olympic marathon test event half marathon.

In Kansai it was the men's races that were relatively low-key, Katsuhiko Suzuki (SGH Group) winning the 10000 m in 28:45.19, Ayumu Kobayashi (NTT Nishi Nihon) the 5000 m in 13:44.16, Yuki Ishii (NTT Nishi Nihon) the 1500 m in 3:45.30, and Jun Shinoto (Sanyo Tokushu Seiko) the 3000 mSC in 8:48.13.

The 60th Chugoku Region meet in Hiroshima rounded out the weekend's action, having already held its 5000 m races last weekend. 5000 m winners Ai Hosoda (Edion) and Dan Kiplangat (JFE Steel) were back, Hosoda taking the women's 10000 m in 32:13.45 and Kiplangat the men's in a meet record 28:01.19. After finishing in the top Japanese spot at last weekend's Olympic test event 5000 m just outside the Olympic qualifying time, Kaede Hagitani (Edion) set a meet record 8:58.67 in the 3000 m, while Donald Mitei (Chugoku Denryoku) took the men's 1500 m in 3:46.06.

Corporate regional action wraps up next weekend with the 64th Kyushu Region meet.

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...

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