Skip to main content

Arakawa and Tomizawa Win Ontake 100-Miler, Onodera and Sakai Take Short Course Titles

 

The OSJ Ontake 100 happened this past weekend, one of Japan's most popular trail ultras. In the 100 km short course race, actually around 109 km, Shingo Nosaka had a 4-minute lead over Yuta Onodera through the first checkpoint at 54 km, splitting 4:26:20 to Onodera's 4:30:39. Running in 3rd and 4th at that point, Ryo Murata and Yuichi Miura were another 4 minutes back, but over the tough 2nd half both dropped out. Nosaka faded too, caught by Onodera before the second checkpoint at 83 km, but he rallied over the last 26 km to close a minute and a half on Onodera's lead. In the end, Onodera won by almost 9 minutes in 9:23:20, Nosaka 2nd in 9:32:16 and Hironori Nomoto running strong over the second half for 3rd in 9:39:59.

In the women's 109 km race, Ethiopian Mulu Seboka, a 2:21:56 runner who was 5th in Chicago 2015 and won Toronto in 2014, led by half an hour at the first checkpoint and sat at 13th overall in 5:05:09. But on a course that rewarded more caution, the middle section of the race proved too much and she dropped out. Chiyuki Mochizuki, a 100 km national team member, was next in 5:34:54 at the first checkpoint but had a lot of trouble on the hilly middle section and dropped to 4th by the end of the race. 3rd at the first checkpoint in 5:40:03, Natsuki Sakai stayed strong when it counted and took the win in 12:17:48, over 8 minutes up on 2nd-placer Yuki Kumori, 12:25:54 with an almost even 1st checkpoint split of 6:05:30. Rieko Ito was 3rd in 12:34:15.

In the main event, the 100 mile long course race, slightly long at 163 km, Jun Arakawa went out hard, up by 16 minutes at the 54 km checkpoint in 5:01:54. Over the next two segments Yuki Tairaku closed to within 25 seconds, but on the final section Arakawa pulled away again to win in 17:36:02 with Tairaku next in 17:45:00. Tsuyoshi Fukuzawa ran very conservatively through the first two segments before attacking the last two, clocking the fastest splits in the field on the 3rd and 4th segments to take 3rd in 17:47:24.

Izumi Tomizawa and Tomomi Hara had a close one in the women's long course, Tomizawa up by 16:55 at the second checkpoint but Hara closing that down to 1:53 by race's end. Tomizawa took the win in 19:36:21 and Hara 2nd in 19:48:24. Veteran Mariko Kirihata was far back in 3rd in 21:33:36.

© 2024 Brett Larner, all rights reserved

Buy Me A Coffee

Labels:

Comments

Post a Comment

Most-Read This Week

Hakone Champ AGU Hits 50 km a Day in Spring Break Training Camp

Having scored its 3rd-straight Hakone Ekiden win this past January, Aoyama Gakuin University spent the Golden Week spring holidays training on the Myoko Plateau in Niigata from May 2-6. Along with the champion men's ekiden team, the first 2 members of AGU's new women's long distance team Nodoka Ashida and Kairi Ikeno , and AGU alumni and 2026 New Year Ekiden champion GMO team members Yuya Yoshida and Asahi Kuroda also took part in the training camp. Depending on the day's training schedule, mileage at the camp was over 50 km a day. AGU men's captain Kaito Nakamura confidently said, "This Golden Week training camp is where we lay the foundations for our 4th-straight Hakone title." A lot of people spend Golden Week on vacation, but the AGU ekiden team spent their time working hard on Myoko's rolling land amid the sprouting leaves of spring. On the 2nd day of the camp, May 3, team members woke up at 5:00 a.m. to do their warmup. The team assembled a...
2 comments
Read more

Everything You Need to Know About the 2026 Hakone Ekiden

The Hakone Ekiden is the world's biggest road race, 2 days of road relay action with Japan's 20 best university teams racing 10 half marathon-scale legs from central Tokyo to the mountains east of Mount Fuji and back. The level just keeps going higher and higher , hitting the point this year where there are teams with 10-runner averages of 13:33.10 for 5000 m, 27:55.98 for 10000 m, and 1:01:20 for the half marathon. It's never been better, and with great weather in the forecast it's safe to say this could be one of the best races in Hakone's 102-year history, especially on Day One. If you've seen it then you know NTV's live broadcast is the best sports broadcast in the world, with the pre-race show kicking off at 7:00 a.m. Japan time on the 2nd and 3rd and the race starting at 8:00 a.m. sharp. If you've got a VPN you should be able to watch it on TVer starting at 7:50 a.m. on the 2nd , and again at 7:50 a.m. on the 3rd . There's even a 2-hour high...
3 comments
Read more

Shikama and Njeri Win Sendai International Half Marathon

Shunsuke Shikama (Logisteed) and Tabitha Njeri Kamau (Mitsui Sumitomo Kaijo) won the Sendai International Half Marathon Sunday in Sendai, Shikama in 1:01:31 and Njeri in 1:09:20. Mizuki Nishimura (Tenmaya) was the top Japanese woman at 2nd overall. The men's race went through 5 km in 14:34 and 10 km in 29:22. Shikama ran alongside top competition including Shoki Yamaguchi (Soka Univ.), who has been running well in half marathons this season, and Tokyo World Championships marathon team member Naoki Koyama (Honda). On a course with many small ups and downs, Shikama attacked on a downhill just after 15 km, quickly breaking free of the lead group of 7. 13 seconds up by 20 km, Shikama covered the last 1.0975 km in 3:06 to seal his first Sendai title. A graduate of Juntendo University , Shikama is in his 4th season with Logisteed. At the 2024 National Corporate Half Marathon he ran 1:00:41, and at last year's East Japan Corporate Ekiden he won the Third Stage. In his marathon d...
Post a Comment
Read more