Blummenfelt Wins Olympic Triathlon, Nener and Odakura Make Top 20

One of the only events to offer the average resident of Tokyo the chance to see Olympians in action with their own eyes, the men's triathlon went off with a snagged start Monday morning in Odaiba, Tokyo. A top 10 finisher in the 5000 m at the 2016 World U20 Championships, Alex Yee (Great Britain) did most of the heavy lifting on the run, reeling in breakaway bike leader Andrea Salvisberg (Switzerland) and shaking the lead group down to a trio with Hayden Wilde (New Zealand), 3rd in the pre-Olympic test event, and Kristian Blummenfelt (Norway), with two-time Olympic medalist Jonathan Brownlee (Great Britain) in tow.

Late in the last lap Blummenfelt executed the same strategy he did in winning May's WTCS Yokohama, powering away from both Yee and Wilde and opening a lead of 11 seconds to take gold. Yee claimed silver for his work, making it three-straight Olympics with a British man on the podium, with Wilde another 9 seconds back to take bronze, bringing New Zealand back into the medals for the first time since 2008. Brownlee ended up 5th, run down by one second by Martin van Riel (Belgium).

Further back, Kenji Nener (Japan) had a good start, strong on the swim and moving up to 8th place the bike. Nener, who trains with the Yamanashi Gakuin University men's ekiden team, fell to 14th on the run and came up short of Japan's best-ever Olympic placing of 13th, but ended the race only 11 seconds out of the top 10. and in a photo-finish with 2019 World Champion Vincent Luis (France).

The other Japnaese man in the race, Makoto Odakura was 39 seconds behind Nener in 19th, Japan's 3rd-best placing in the Olympics and making it the first time the country put two men in the top 20. In the lead-up to the pre-pandemic, pre-postponement Tokyo Olympics Japanese men's triathlon looked to be at an inter-generational low point, but with a day like this on home ground in front of an enthusiastic crowd the sport has stepped up a level in a way that's bound to pay off in the coming years.

Tokyo Olympic Games Men's Triathlon

Tokyo, 26 July, 2021

complete results

1. Kristian Blummenfelt (Norway) - 1:45:04

2. Alex Yee (Great Britain) - 1:45:15

3. Hayden Wilde (New Zealand) - 1:45:24

4. Marten van Riel (Belgium) - 1:45:52

5. Jonathan Brownlee (Great Britain) - 1:45:53

6. Kevin McDowell (U.S.A.) - 1:45:54

7. Bence Bicsak (Hungary) - 1:45:56

8. Gustav Iden (Norway)- 1:46:00

9. Max Studer (Switzerland) - 1:46:06

10. Mario Mola (Spain) - 1:46:13

-----

14. Kenji Nener (Japan) - 1:46:24

19. Makoto Odakura (Japan) - 1:47:03

Australian YouTuber Handed Lifetime Ban by Ageo City Half Marathon After Running 1:06 with Another Runner's Bib (updated)

After discussion with their race's chief JAAF referee, on Nov. 27 the organizers of the Ageo City Half Marathon handed down a lifetime ban from their event against 36-year-old Australian Matt Inglis Fox for running the Nov. 15 race wearing the bib number of another JAAF-registered runner. The incident came to light after Fox posted on his personal Instagram account that he had run a PB of 1:06:33 and finished 203rd in Ageo with a 10 km split of 31:03, along with photos and video of himself in the race wearing a bib number beginning with 11. Fox did not appear in the results by name or in that time or place, the closest match being a 1:06:54 gross, 1:06:50 net finish time with a 31:21 10 km split for 18th place in the JAAF-registered division and 209th overall by bib number 1129, registered to a non-Japanese Tokyo-resident club runner. The club runner, Harrisson Uk , readily confirmed that he had given his bib to Fox, saying, "I gave my number to Matt. It wasn't me."...

How it Happened

Ancient History I went to Wesleyan University, where the legend of four-time Boston Marathon champ and Wes alum Bill Rodgers hung heavy over the cross-country team. Inspired by Koichi Morishita and Young-Cho Hwang’s duel at the 1992 Barcelona Olympics I ran my first marathon in 1993, qualifying for Boston ’94 where Bill was kind enough to sign a star-struck 20-year-old me’s bib number at the expo. Three years later I moved to Japan for grad school, and through a long string of coincidences I came across a teenaged kid named Yuki Kawauchi down at my neighborhood track. I never imagined he’d become what he is, but right from the start there was just something different about him. After his 2:08:37 breakthrough at the 2011 Tokyo Marathon he called me up and asked me to help him get into races abroad. He’d finished 3rd on the brutal downhill Sixth Stage at the Hakone Ekiden, and given how he’d run the hills in the last 6 km at Tokyo ’11 I thought he’d do well at Boston or New York. “I...

Nat'l University Ekiden Updates Here

Looks like I just went over my update limit on Twitter - sorry, it's the first time I've tried to use it for this. I'll look for another option next time. In the meantime I'll add updates to the comments below. Not sure if that has a max too but I guess we'll find out. Update: Part one of the Nationals commentary can be found here .

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