Weekend Overseas Race Roundup

At least three noteworthy international races had Japanese athletes in their fields this weekend. Fresh off his 6th-place finish at the Budapest World Championships, 3000 m steeplechase national record holder Ryuji Miura (Juntendo Univ.) took 7th at Saturday's Xiamen Diamond League meet in China, running 8:18.32 to winner El Bakkali Soufiane's 8:10.31.

Also Saturday, Waseda University athletes Tomonori Yamaguchi, Haruto Ishizuka and Taishi Ito ran the Birell 10 km Road Race in Prague along with corporate leaguer Ryota Kondo (Toyota Boshoku). Both Yamaguchi and Ito ran faster than their track 10000 m PBs, Yamaguchi the top Japanese man at 8th in 29:13, Ishizuka 9th in 29:17, Kondo 10th in 29:28 and Ito 11th in 29:29. Japan-based Alexander Mutiso (ND Software) was 2nd in 27:48 behind Ethiopian Tadese Worku, 1st in 29:35.

Sunday at Germany's Volksbank Muenster Marathon, Ai Ikemoto made her international marathon debut with a 4th-place finish in 2:41:30. "I was disappointed with my time," she said, having run 2:34 in her previous two marathons. "But 4th was pretty good for my first international marathon, and I got a lot of experience including my first drug test." Rebeca Jeruto Cherop won in 2:29:13, so exhausted she walked across the finish line, with former Toyota Boshoku runner Charles Muneria setting a new men's course record of 2:09:07. Defending women's champ and course record holder Lilian Jelagat suffered a serious injury early in the race, tearing her Achilles tendon in one leg badly enough to require staying in Germany for surgery on Wednesday.

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