japan running news

Pretty much every year I write something about how the level of the college athletes at the Hakone Ekiden just keeps going up and up. This year too, the performances by collegiate men at February's Marugame Half and last month's string of 10000 m time trial meets were off the charts. There's got to be a peak somewhere, but it doesn't look like it's anywhere close. How much have things really progressed? Let's take a quick look at the level of the fields at some of the Hakones since 2005. That year there were 19 college teams and one select team, so for the sake of consistency these numbers represent the top 19-ranked teams in the field at each Hakone. With Hakone happening on Jan. 2-3 every year, the listed years are the Hakone year, with the performances listed happening in the calendar year before that. Progression in the 5000 m from 2005 to 2020 was pretty steady, the largest jump happening between 2005 and 2010 at about 3 sec/km. After almost no change from...

Yasushi Sakaguchi , who guided the Chugoku Denryoku men's corporate team to the peak of its power as its head coach and later executive head coach, retired from the team at the end of June. Appearing at his final race on June 29, he said, "It all went by in a blur. I was blessed with the right people for 35 years." Sakaguchi helped co-found the Chugoku Denryoku team, working to build the team up from zero and becoming its head coach in 1994. "We started with the basics, and built Chugoku Denryoku up into a well-known powerhouse in athletics," he said. Sakaguchi's coaching style encouraging the independence of his athletes helped produced Olympians, World Championships medalists and national record breakers like Shigeru Aburaya , Tsuyoshi Ogata and Atsushi Sato . In the team's golden era it even won the New Year Ekiden national title. Asked what athletics has meant to him, Sakaguchi answered, "I got to experience the world, and to see it in all its...

Beijing Olympic marathoner and former team member Atsushi Sato , 43, has been named head coach of the Chugoku Denryoku  men's corporate team as of the beginning of this month. Coming back to the team after 8 years, Sato is a strong choice to succeed Yasushi Sakaguchi  and return it to its previous position as a leading producer of top-level athletes. "I'm very happy to be a part of helping the team I belonged to develop," Sato said. "I want it to evolve and grow, not just make a comeback." Sato is a native of Fukushima. A graduate of Aizu H.S.  and Waseda University , he joined Chugoku Denryoku in 2001. With his main focus on the marathon he ran 2:07:13 at the 2007 Fukuoka International Marathon , at the time the 4th-fastest ever by a Japanese man. At the 2008 Beijing Olympics he finished in last place in 76th, but a year later he came back and made 6th at the 2009 Berlin World Championships . He retired following the 2013 Fukuoka International Marathon , ...

On Sept. 6 it was learned that Kyocera women's corporate team head coach Atsushi Sato , 42 had submitted his resignation from his position and the company on Aug. 31. In an interview with the Fukushima Minyu newspaper Sato commented, "I couldn't produce the results that the company was looking for. The team was improving bit by bit, so it's very unfortunate." His assistant coach and wife Miho Sato has also left the Kyocera organization. The couple's future plans are undecided. A graduate of Aizu H.S. and Waseda University and the former half marathon national record holder, Atsushi became head coach at Kyocera in April, 2014. Miho, the women's 800 m national record holder, joined at the same time to form a highly anticipated coaching duo with Olympic experience on both sides. Starting with only two members, the pair built a quality roster that included 2019 Doha World Championships 10000 m runner Minami Yamanouch i and the top Japanese finisher at the...

Yamada Denki assistant coach Hirokazu Miyauchi, Ayumi Nakayama, Honda assistant coach Yosuke Osawa, 1960 Olympic marathoner and former Canadian national record holder Gord Dickson, Maki Suzawa and Minoru Okuda. Part five in a series of republished interviews. Speaking of his experience in Japan not long after winning the Beijing Olympics marathon, Kenyan  Samuel Wanjiru said, "Japanese people are conservative and don't like change." Well, sometimes things do change. In response to an invitation from race organizers interested in diversifying their elite field, the Honda and Yamada Denki corporate teams agreed to send three young runners to the 2010 Toronto Waterfront Marathon, two of them for their marathon debuts, with support from JRN.  Minoru Okuda (25, Honda) was a Hakone Ekiden star at Chuo University. Ayumi Nakayama (25, Yamada Denki) has four marathons, a best of 2:28:51 and bad luck with weather to her name. Just 22, Maki Suzawa (Yamada Denki) won the 2...

interview by Brett Larner translated by Brett Larner and Mika Tokairin Running in miserable conditions at the 2010 Tokyo Marathon, Arata Fujiwara  came 2nd for the second time in his career. The next day, a badly limping Fujiwara generously met with JRN at a favorite bar of his to talk about the race, training, future, and what went wrong and right. Part one of the post-race interview focused on this year's race. Part two, below, talks about Fujiwara's motivations, his training for Tokyo, and the Japanese corporate running system compared with the situation in Africa, Europe and the United States. Click here for Fujiwara's three-part pre-race interview. In 2008 Tokyo didn’t have prize money, so this was your first time really running for it. Did it make a difference? Yeah, when there’s prize money you have more guts. This time, in the last 2 km there was a negotiation between my legs and the prize money. (laughs) I got the ‘go’ sign. Having prize money encoura...

interview by Brett Larner translated by Brett Larner and Mika Tokairin Part four of a five-part interview . Running in miserable conditions at the 2010 Tokyo Marathon,  Arata Fujiwara  came 2nd in Tokyo for the second time in his career. The next day, a badly limping Fujiwara generously met with JRN at a favorite bar of his to talk about the race, training, future, and what went wrong and right. Part four of the interview below focuses on this year's race. Part five talks about Fujiwara's motivations, his training for Tokyo, and the Japanese corporate running system compared with the situation in Africa, Europe and the United States. Congratulations on your first marathon in the 2:10’s. (laughs) Thanks, yeah, I broke through the wall. Having seen your last four marathons, when I watched the video of this year’s Tokyo Marathon I felt that it was the first time you had run like a marathoner, like you really understood the marathon. Compared to your last five mara...

With the men really getting up to speed this year nobody really noticed that it was one of the best in history for the women too. A first-ever world-level distance gold medal on the track, all-time top 10 marks over 5000 m, 10000 m and the marathon and a top 15 mark in the half marathon, and the fastest average of its 10 best marathon performances since back in the golden years of 2005. Rina Nabeshima (Japan Post) topped the 5000 m rankings with a 15:10.91 PB at the Prefontaine Classic in May. It's rare to see Japanese athletes in the Diamond League, but Nabeshima took multiple swings that delivered both her 5000 m time and an 8:48:21 in London , the second-fastest Japanese time ever and less than 4 seconds off the national record. Nozomi Tanaka (ND 28 AC), who won the gold medal over the summer in the World U20 Championships 3000 m, also made the all-time Japanese top 25 for 5000 m with a 15:15.80 in October , the only Japanese woman to date to have cleared the 2019 Do...