Singh Breaks Indian 5000 m NR to Win Yogibo Athletics Challenge Cup

After two days of flight cancelations and delays that ended up with him arriving in Niigata 4.5 hours before the race, Indian men's 5000 m NR holder Gulveer Singh came through with a record-breaking run to win the 5000 m on the first day of the Yogibo Athletics Challenge Cup Continental Tour Bronze meet.

Set up as a shot at the 13:08.40 Japanese NR, the race went out with steady 63-second laps with pacing from 10-mile world best holder Benard Koech. After the pack settled out 2024 Komazawa University grad Mebuki Suzuki was at the front behind Koech with this year's Komazawa captain Kotaro Shinohara right with him. When a gap opened Singh moved up from 5th or 6th to go with them.

Koech stepped off at 4000 m leaving Suzuki to lead, Shinohara struggling to hang on and coming back twice after falling off. At the bell Singh went to the front, and with a 55-second last lap he held off Suzuki in the last 100 m to win in 13:11.82, 7 seconds under his old NR. Suzuki ran a PB 13:18.80 for all-time Japanese #9, with Shinohara running 13:15.70, the fastest-ever outdoor 5000 m by a Japanese-born collegiate runner and 10th-fastest ever by a Japanese man, for 3rd.

"I'm very happy," Singh told JRN post-race. "That was better than I was expecting." Disappointed at missing the Japanese record, Suzuki said, "It was OK. I'd give it about an 80%." Celebrating after finishing, Shinohara said, "That was great! Next up Izumo!"

The women's 5000 m was mostly a four-way battle between Hellen Ekarare, Mirriam Cherop, Tabitha Njeri Kamau and Caroline Kariba, Olympian Haruka Kokai the only Japanese woman to try going with them at 3:02-3:03/1000 m but dropping off after a few laps. Ekarare did most of the leading until Cherop made a jab with a move to the front after 3000 m that motivated the others to all take turns surging. But Ekarare had the close to pull away over the last 1000 m for the win in 15:08.51. Cherop was next in 15:13.56 and Njeri 3rd in 15:14.62, with Kokai hanging onto the top Japanese spot at 5th in 15:31.42.

Miriam Njeri of Sendai Ikuei H.S. won the U20 women's 3000 m by over 16 seconds in 9:07.82, with Saki Katagihara taking the 1500 m in 4:15.76 over Korean Yu Jin Kim. Nanako Matsumoto won the 400 m in 52.74. On the field, in her final competition Australia-resident brit Jade Lally won the discus throw for the third year in a row with a 59.77 m on her final attempt. In the absence of NR holder Sumire Hata, Maya Takeuchi won the long jump with a 6.11 m (-1.0) last-round jump, equalling leader Ria Kitada but surpassing her 2nd-best jump at 6.05 m (+0.3) to Kitada's 5.98 m (0.0).

Korean Jong Hak Park outran South Sudanese Olympian Abraham Guem by 0.08 to win the men's 1500 m in 3:41.99, with Ryoto Aoki 3rd in 3:42.34 for top Japanese. 400 m NR holder Kentaro Sato out ran Joseph Nakajima, Fuga Sato and Sri Lankan Kalinga Kumarage for the win in 45.40. Masateru Yugami won the men's discus throw at 58.46 m.

Complete results here. The Yogibo Athletics Challenge Cup continues Sunday, with the highlight being the 800 m featuring teenaged NR holders Rin Kubo and Ko Ochiai.

19-Yr-Old Munakata Breaks Miura's U20 NR to Win Ageo City Half Marathon

The Ageo City Half Marathon is always big, the main race that the coaches of Hakone Ekiden-bound university men's teams use for firming up their entry rosters for the big show. That makes what's basically an idyllic small town race into one of the world's great road races, with depth unmatched anywhere. One of the top-tier people on the start list at 1:02:07, Kodai Miyaoka (Hosei Univ.) took the race out fast, but the entire pack was keying off the fastest man in the race, Reishi Yoshida (Chuo Gakuin Univ.), 1:00:31. Yoshida reeled Miyaoka in before 5 km and kept things steady in the low-1:01 range, wearing down the lead group to around 10 including his CGU teammate Taisei Ichikawa , a quartet from Izumo and National University Ekiden runner-up Komazawa University , 2 runners from local Daito Bunka University , 2:07:54 marathoner Atsumi Ashiwa (Honda), and Australian Ed Goddard . Right after 15 km Komazawa went into action, Yudai Kiyama , Hibiki Murakami and Haru Tanin

Ageo City Half Marathon Preview and Streaming

This weekend's big race is the Ageo City Half Marathon , the next stop on the collegiate men's circuit. Most of the universities bound for the Jan. 2-3 Hakone Ekiden use Ageo to thin down the list of contenders for their final Hakone rosters, and with JRN's development program that sends the first two Japanese collegiate finishers in Ageo to the United Airlines NYC Half every year a lot of coaches put in some of their A-listers too. That gives Ageo legendary depth and fast front-end speed, with a 1:00:47 course record last year from Kenyan corporate leaguer Paul Kuira (JR Higashi Nihon) and the top 26 all clearing 63 minutes. Since a lot of programs just enter everybody on their rosters you never really know who on the entry list is actually going to show up, but if even a quarter of the people at the top end of this year's list run it'll be a great race, even if conditions are looking likely to be a bit warmer than ideal. Chuo Gakuin University 's Reishi Yoshi

Shiojiri, Kasai and Tazawa Scratch from Hachioji Long Distance, 5000 m Dropped from Program (updated)

On Nov. 15 the East Japan Corporate Federation announced that 10000 m national champion and Paris Olympian Jun Kasai (Asahi Kasei) and Budapest World Championships team member Ren Tazawa (Toyota) have both withdrawn from the 10000 m at the Nov. 23 Hachioji Long Distance meet. This year's Hachioji Long Distance features a special heat set up to target the 27:00.00 qualifying standard for next year's Tokyo World Championships. Along with Kasai and Tazawa, national record holder Kazuya Shiojiri (Fujitsu) and other top-level Japanese talent are scheduled to compete. After last January's New Year Ekiden , Tazawa sustained an injury that forced him to miss May's National Championships 10000 m and other races including the Paris Olympics. At the end of September he ran 13:36.99 for 5th at the Yogibo Athletics Challenge Cup meet, but, he said, "My balance felt off and the back of my left knee hurt." In Kasai's case, after winning the national title in M

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