10000 m National Championships Preview

Less than five months since the 2023 10000 m National Championships went down at the 2021 Olympic stadium in Tokyo, the 2024 edition happens Friday at Shizuoka's Ecopa Stadium, with NHK broadcasting it live starting at 19:25 local time. Doubling up on Nationals like this lets Japanese athletes double dip on placing points to try to get into the Paris Olympics on rankings. But between the number of people who've hit the 30:40.00 women's standard and 27:00.00 men's standard and the lopsided eight spots given away to top placers at World XC, there are only four women's spots and three men's available via rankings. Of those, three of the four women's spots and two of the three men's spots are currently occupied by top placers at December's 2023 Nationals, Ririka Hironaka, Haruka Kokai and Rino Goshima for women and Ren Tazawa and Tomoki Ota for men.

The 2023 Nationals did get close to the standards, with Hironaka leading the top four women under 31:00 and Kazuya Shiojiri running a national record 27:09.80 to win the men's title. The top woman globally in the Paris rankings with the standard or XC backdoor, Hironaka has scratched this time around, but both Kokai and Goshima are back along with December's runner-up Yuka Takashima. Given the few slots left they kind of have to go for the Olympic standard. Like last time, that's made easier thanks to the Wavelight and Kenyan pacers.

It wouldn't take much for Kokai to improve her score, but to pass either GBR's Jessica Warner-Judd or Hironaka on points she'd have to run sub-30. Goshima and Takashima both have a chance of passing Kokai on points, but with the risk of spots getting eliminated by someone else hitting the standard somewhere, best to try to go one step beyond what they did together in December. Barring that, it's a race not to be the fourth Japanese woman between the three lining up in Shizuoka and Hironaka.

At 27:09.80 Shiojiri is closer to the standard than any of the women and has one fewer slot left to work with, so he really needs to take a serious shot at sub-27. If not, a win in 27:53.72 or better would put him ahead of France's Jimmy Gressier as the top rankings qualifier worldwide in the Paris quota. 2023 Nationals runner-up Ota, 27:12.53, would need a win in 27:44.70 or something faster for a lower finish to pass Gressier. 3rd at Nationals, former NR holder Akira Aizawa, 27:13.04, would need a 27:40.85 win. 4th last time, Tazawa is currently the top Japanese man in the quota but has scratched from Friday's Nationals. There's a pretty good chance all three rankings spots left in the quota will be filled by Japanese athletes come Saturday morning, and like with the women it'll be a race not to the 4th out of the four favorites.

2024 National Championships 10000 m Entry Lists

Ecopa Stadium, Shizuoka, 3 May 2024

Women

Yuka Takashima (Shiseido) - 30:57.26

Haruka Kokai (Daiichi Seimei) - 30:57.67

Rino Goshima (Shiseido) - 30:58.83

Mikuni Yada (Edion) - 31:34.39

Miyaka Sugata (Japan Post) - 31:49.20

Tomo Muramatsu (Ritsumeikan Univ.) - 31:51.78

Kaede Kawamura (Iwatani Sangyo) - 31:54.73

Momoka Kawaguchi (Uniqlo) - 31:57.81

Wakana Itsuki (Kyudenko) - 31:58.59

Kazuna Kanetomo (Mitsui Sumitomo Kaijo) - 32:27.84

pacer - Judy Jepngetich (Shiseido) - 14:50.20

Men

Kazuya Shiojiri (Fujitsu) - 27:09.80

Tomoki Ota (Toyota) - 27:12.53

Akira Aizawa (Asahi Kasei) - 27:13.04

Ayumu Kobayashi (NTT Nishi Nihon) - 27:28.13

Mebuki Suzuki (Toyota) - 27:30.69

Jun Kasai (Asahi Kasei) - 27:36.75

Kotaro Shinohara (Komazawa Univ.) - 27:38.66

Yusuke Tamura (Kurosaki Harima) - 27:43.11

Ryuto Igawa (Asahi Kasei) - 27:47.21

Shunya Kikuchi (Chugoku Denryoku) - 27:47.76

Akira Akasaki (Kyudenko) - 27:48.09

Takashi Ichida (Asahi Kasei) - 27:48.22

Shunsuke Shikama (Logisteed) - 27:50.05

Yuto Imae (GMO) - 27:50.93

Yuya Yoshida (GMO) - 27:51.26

Tamaki Fujimoto (Logisteed) - 27:54.81

Shinichiro Nakamura (Kyudenko) - 27:54.93

Chikara Yamano (Kyudenko) - 27:55.57

Shoya Saito (Josai Univ.) - 27:59.68

Sodai Shimizu (Otsuka Seiyaku) - 28:01.47

Kazuma Maeda (Tokyo Nogyo Univ.) - 28:03.51

Kazuma Hattori (NTT Nishi Nihon) - 28:05.44

Aritaka Kajiwara (Comodi Iida) - 28:08.21

Tatsuya Iyoda (Fujitsu) - 28:06.26

Tomonori Yamaguchi (Waseda Univ.) - 28:17.87

pacer - Emmanuel Maru (Toyota Boshoku) - 27:09.06

Chepkirui Over Sato Again to Win 2nd-Straight Nagoya Women's Marathon, Chen Breaks Malaysian NR (updated)

This year's Nagoya Women's Marathon felt like a changing of the guard, with some the bigger domestic names over the last few years fading early and a lot of newer faces stepping up with quality debuts or second marathons. The front group was set to be paced for 2:20 flat with the 2nd group at 2:23:30 to hit the auto-qualifying time for the 2027 MGC Race, Japan's L.A. Olympics marathon trials race in Nagoya. Up front things went out OK, but after a 33:10 split at 10 km Ayuko Suzuki , 2:21:22 here 2 years ago, lost touch, ultimately finishing 23rd in 2:33:28. Windy conditions started to play with pacers' ability to keep things steady and the pace slowed majorly over the next 10 km, but even with a 34:05 second 10 km there were big-name casualties. 2024 Nagoya winner Yuka Ando was next to drop, ending up 17th in 2:30:32. NR holder Honami Maeda was next, followed quickly by Bahraini Kenyan Eunice Chumba and debuting Wakana Kabasawa . Maeda faded to 21st in 2:31:21, whil...

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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...

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