Skip to main content

Nagoya Women's Marathon Elite Field


2022 Oregon World Championships gold medalist and 2023 Budapest World Championships silver medalist Gotytom Gebreslase leads the elite field for the Mar. 10 Nagoya Women's Marathon, the last chance for Japanese women to steal a place on the Paris Olympics team. The last two years Nagoya has had a $250,000 payout for the winner, the biggest in the sport, but with the exchange rate and Japan's economic situation being what it is that's down to $150,000 this year. That's still enough to pull in a big talent like Gebreslase, the only woman in the field positioned to verrrry hypothetically drag one of the Japanese women to the 2:18:58 they'd need to pick up the 3rd Paris team spot.

Ai Hosoda was 3rd at October's Olympic trials but was bumped down to 1st alternate by Honami Maeda's 2:18:59 NR last month in Osaka. Hosoda, Ayuko Suzuki, Rika Kaseda and Yuka Ando have run under or within seconds of the 2:21:41 they needed before Maeda's run, but 2:18 puts it pretty much out of range without a miracle. That's not to say it's not going to be a good race, with 2023 Asian Games gold medalist Eunice Chumba and sub-2:21 runner Delvine Meringor also up in position to keep it fast, and an exciting debut from sub-67 half marathoner Pauline Kamulu. Suzuki and Ando both come in off good half marathon performances in the last couple of weeks, so there's a good chance either of them could translate that into a big marathon performance. The only question is how big.

Fuji TV will have the live broadcast starting at 9:00 a.m. local time on Mar. 10. Check back closer to race date for more info.

Nagoya Women's Marathon Elite Field Highlights

Nagoya, Aichi, 10 Mar. 2024
times listed are athletes' best in last 3 years except where noted

Gotytom Gebreslase (Ethiopia) - 2:18:11 (Oregon WC 2022)
Eunice Chebichii Chumba (Bahrain) - 2:20:02 (Seoul 2022)
Delvine Relin Meringor (Romania) - 2:20:49 (Barcelona 2023)
Ai Hosoda (Japan/Edion) - 2:21:42 (London 2022) - withdrawal announced Mar. 1
Ayuko Suzuki (Japan/Japan Post) - 2:21:52 (Nagoya 2023)
Rika Kaseda (Japan/Daihatsu) - 2:21:55 (Berlin 2022)
Yuka Ando (Japan/Wacoal) - 2:22:22 (Nagoya 2022)
Violah Cheptoo (Kenya) - 2:22:44 (New York 2021)
Momoko Watanabe (Japan/Tenmaya) - 2:23:08 (Osaka 2023)
Giovanna Epis (Italy) - 2:23:46 (Hamburg 2023)
Eloise Wellings (Australia) - 2:25:10 (Nagoya 2022)
Hikari Onishi (Japan/Japan Post) - 2:25:54 (Berlin 2022)
Camille French (New Zealand) - 2:26:08 (Valencia 2023)
Zhixuan Li (China) - 2:26:28 (Nagoya 2023)
Kaori Morita (Japan/Panasonic) - 2:26:31 (Tokyo 2023) - withdrawal announced Mar. 1
Yuri Karasawa (Japan/Kyudenko) - 2:27:27 (Osaka 2023)
Honoka Tanaike (Japan/Otsuka Seiyaku) - 2:27:30 (Nagoya 2023)
Sakiho Tsutsui (Japan/Yamada Holdings) - 2:27:38 (Hofu 2023)
Yuyu Xia (China) - 2:28:57 (Beijing 2022)
Kaena Takeyama (Japan/Senko) - 2:29:20 (Osaka Women's 2023)
Beverly Ramos (Puerto Rico) - 2:31:10 (Oregon WC 2022)
Yuri Mitsune (Japan/18 Ginko) - 2:31:10 (Nagoya 2023)
Yuki Nakamura (Japan/Panasonic) - debut - 1:46:47 (Ome 30 km 2023)
Pauline Kamulu (Kenya/Route Inn Hotels) - debut - 1:07:22 (Marugame Half 2023) - withdrawal announced Mar. 1

© 2024 Brett Larner, all rights reserved

Buy Me A Coffee


Comments

Most-Read This Week

Australian Male Arrested on Drug Smuggling Charges After Entering Japan for Osaka Marathon

On Apr. 9 the Kinki Region Bureau of Health, Labor and Welfare's Drug Control Division arrested Matthew Inglis Fox , 38, an Australian business owner of no known fixed address, on charges of violating the importation regulations of the Narcotics Control Act by smuggling tablets containing marijuana elements from the United States. The suspect had entered Japan in February to run in the Osaka Marathon . The suspect was arrested on suspicion of smuggling approximately 12 pills containing marijuana by sending them from a U.S. airport to Osaka's Kansai Airport using an international courier service on Feb. 19. The Osaka branch of the Customs Service discovered the tablets in arriving cargo and suspected them to be narcotics. Customs contacted the Narcotics Control Division, which then began its investigation of the case. According to the Narcotics Control Division, the suspect denies the charges.  Translator's note: Fox, who received a lifetime ban from the Ageo City Half Mara...

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."...

Tokyo Olympics Marathon Trials Winner Nakamura Enters Waseda Grad School

An Olympian in the marathon at the Tokyo Olympics, Shogo Nakamura (Fujitsu) announced on his social media that he has entered Waseda University 's Graduate School of Sport Science with the start of the new academic year this week. A graduate of Mie's Ueno Kogyo H.S. , Nakamura went to Komazawa University before joining Fujitsu in 2015. His senior year of high school he was 3rd overall and 2nd Japanese in the 5000 m at the National High School Track and Field Championships, and in the fall the same year he ran what was at the time the 7th-fastest high school mark ever, 13:50.38. At Komazawa he scored four individual stage wins across the three big university ekidens. In 2019 he won the MGC Race, Japan's marathon trials for the Tokyo Olympics, where he was 62nd in 2:22:23. Nakamura indicated that he would be studying "top sports management" under professor Takeo Hirata . "I'll be balancing competition and academics," Nakamura wrote. "I'm r...