japan running news

http://www.chugoku-np.co.jp/News/Tn200902250050.html

translated by Brett Larner

Kojokan High School is sending three athletes to compete at the Asian Cross Country Championships in Bahrain on Mar. 1. Seniors Rei Obara (18) and Ai Kuboki (18) will join alumna Risa Shigetomo (21, Team Tenmaya) on the Japanese national team in Bahrain. For Kuboki it will be her first overseas race. "I want to soak up the atmosphere and the chance to race against foreign athletes and hope that it helps me to take my running to the next level," she told reporters.

Obara will be running in the junior women's 6 km race. Obara comes to the championships after having won both the 5000 m at October's nationals and the 1st stage of December's National High School Ekiden. Kuboki will be in the same race, having finished 3rd nationally in the 3000 m and helping her team finish as runner-up in the National High School Ekiden with a 4th place run on the 5th stage.

Shigetomi will run in the senior w…

by Brett Larner


Click picture for video highlights.








Identical twin sisters Moe and Haruka Kyuma were the surprise stars of the 2009 National Interprefectural Women’s Ekiden on Jan. 11, the two junior high school students making up most of Kyoto Prefecture’s 1 minute 24 second margin of victory in its 5th-straight national title and putting anchor Kazue Kojima in position for a comfortable anchor run.

47 teams, one from each of Japan’s prefectures, competed in the 27th running of the nine-stage 42.195 km national competition in Kyoto which teams up professional runners with university, high school and junior high school runners. Two stages were reserved for junior high school runners and two for high school athletes, the other five stages being a mix of runners from all four categories. Slightly windy conditions hampered defending champion Kyoto’s chances of breaking its course record of 2:14:58 from last year’s running but did not prevent two new stage records.

1st Stage – 6.0 km
Yurika Na…