japan running news

  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,...

by Brett Larner @JRNHeadlines pic.twitter.com/uqE9UrqAYw — John O'Regan (@johnoregan777) November 29, 2016 Hideaki Yamauchi become the fourth Japanese man in the last ten years to win the IAU 100 km World Championships , coming from three minutes behind to outrun South Africa's Bongmusa Mthembu , Italian three-time world champion Giorgio Calcaterra and others to win Sunday's race in Los Alcazares, Spain by nearly six minutes.  Yamauchi's winning time of 6:18:22 was the fifth-fastest ever for the 100 km distance , making him the all-time #4 man worldwide just behind world record holder Takahiro Sunada .  Yamauchi's teammates Kaitaro Toike and Yoshiki Takada took 8th and 23rd, giving Japan the team silver medal by a slim margin behind South Africa.  The U.S.A. team took bronze on the strength of two top five finishes. No Japanese women scored individual medals, but with a 5-6-7 finish separated by only 17 seconds the trio of Mikiko Ota , Aiko Kanematsu ...

'Budd and Herron Win the 28th IAU 100 km World Championships' click here for complete results Japanese results Men 11. Tatsuya Itagaki - 6:52:37 35. Yoshikazu Hara - 7:13:33 42. Yoshiki Takada - 7:21:52 63. Tsutomu Nagata - 7:45:57 Women 13. Mikiko Ota - 7:52:39 15. Mai Fujisawa - 7:56:59 DNF - Shiho Katayama DNF - Chiyuki Mochizuki 'Jepchirchir Shatters Course Record at Usti Nad Labem Half Marathon' click here for complete results Japanese Results Men 12. Yuki Matsuoka - 1:04:34 13. Rikinobu Watanabe - 1:04:57 15. Ryuji Okada - 1:06:49 Women 7. Mizuki Matsuda - 1:12:54 8. Ai Inoue - 1:13:32 'Karoki Runs World-Leading 59:14 in Copenhagen' click here for complete results Japanese Results Men 25. Ryotaro Otani - 1:05:20 'Farah and Keitany Successfully Defend Great North Run Titles' click here for complete results Japanese Results Men 9. Masato Kikuchi - 1:03:13 DNS - Suguru Osako Women 6. Reia Iwade - 1:12:41

http://dd.hokkaido-np.co.jp/news/area/doto/1-0151017.html http://www.sankei.com/affairs/news/150628/afr1506280022-n1.html translated and edited by Brett Larner A total of 3827 people took part in the 30th anniversary Lake Saroma Ultramarathon in Hokkaido on June 28, challenging their own limits as they ran with support and warm cheering from volunteers, local residents of the towns of Yubetsu, Saroma and Kitami, and the runners' friends and family members. 3326 people ran in the 100 km division.  At the 5:00 a.m. start the temperature in Yubetsu was 8.7 degrees, 1.9 degrees cooler than the usual average temperature.  Running the 100 km for the sixth-straight year, two-time Olympic medalist Erick Wainaina (Kenya) addressed the runners in front of Yubetsu Sports Center, telling them, "100 km is a long way, but just stay focused on your own pace and making it to the finish line," before joining them for the race. 501 runners started in the 50 km division from 100 ...

by Brett Larner Tewelde Estifanos became the first Eritrean man in history to win the Beppu-Oita Mainichi Marathon , running up front throughout the race and dropping Japan's Hiroki Kadota (Team Kanebo) and Hiroyuki Yamamoto (Team Konica Minolta) late in the game to win in a 2:10:18 PB.  Erratic pacing made for an unsual race, with the two Kenyan pacers, tasked with running 3:02/km, doing opening splits of 3:11 and 3:10 before suddenly gunning it to try to hit the mandated 15:10 at 5 km.  Virtually every 5 km they did the same thing, surging a kilometer out from the timing mat to get closer to the desired split before relaxing again. Some of the front group including Estifanos, Kadota, Yamamoto and defending champion Abraham Kiplimo (Uganda) went with them every time, but others including domestic favorites Naoki Okamoto (Team Chugoku Denryoku) and Yusei Nakao (Suzuki Hamamatsu AC) let go, taking their time in working back up to the lead group in time for the pacers'...

by Brett Larner It's another big weekend of elite racing in Japan as everyone from junior high school students through the pros gets ready for the mid-December through mid-January national championship ekiden season.  The only serious women's racing to be found comes at the last full Nittai University Time Trials track meet of the year, where small contingents from top high school, university and corporate teams tune up for the roads over 3000 m and 5000 m.  Two weeks after winning silver at the 100 km World Championships in Doha, Qatar, Chiyuki Mochizuki (Canon AC Kyushu) features in the 3000 m along with Kenyan Ann Ngatuny (Sendai Ikuei H.S.).  Bigger names in the 5000 m include Doricah Obare (Team Hitachi), Monica Margaret (Aomori Yamada H.S.) and Yuka Hakoyama (Team Wacoal). Coming just a week after 11 men broke 28 minutes at the Hachioji Long Distance 10000 m time trial meet , the all-Kenyan men's 5000 m Heat 26 is the main event at Nittai, with World XC ju...

by Brett Larner complete results coming shortly Sunny skies and warm temperatures greeted the 29th running of the world's fastest ultra, Hokkaido's Lake Saroma 50 km and 100 km Ultramarathon .  Predicted temperatures over 25C meant probable slow times on the course that hosts both the men's and women's 100 km world records, but that did not stop defending men's 100 km winner Hideo Nojo (New Balance) from going for it.  An opening split of 36:03 for the first 10 km put him right on the cusp being on track to break 6 hours, but while that was clearly not going to be sustainable Nojo pushed on ahead of Takahiro Sunada 's 6:13:33 world record pace until nearly halfway before the heat got the better of him.  Slowing to close to 45 minutes per 10 km by 70 km, Nojo rallied late in the race and went back under 40 minutes for the final 10 km to take the win in 6:40:15, three minutes slower than his winning time last year but a world lead by seven and a half minutes....

by Brett Larner In its 62nd running the Feb. 3  Beppu-Oita Mainichi Marathon was billed as one thing and one thing only, a showdown between Japan's most reliable marathoner, London Olympics 6th-place Kentaro Nakamoto  (Team Yasukawa Denki), and its most idiosyncratic, the independent Yuki Kawauchi  (Saitama Pref.). What a gift to Beppu-Oita, an historic race consigned to second-tier status.  It was as if Americans Meb Keflezighi  and Dathan Ritzenhein  lined up to go head-to-head at Grandma's Marathon.   With exceptional performances given consideration in picking the Moscow World Championships team their pre-race goals were clear.   Nakamoto : "My goal is to win a marathon for the first time. I'm aiming to break my PB [2:08:53] ." Kawauchi : "If I run faster than Hiroyuki Horibata did [2:08:24 in Fukuoka last December]  then I might not do Lake Biwa in March."  And did they deliver on those words. The rest of the field and ...

by Brett Larner Updated 1/29/13: Masashi Hayashi (Team Yakult) and Takehiro Arakawa (Team Asahi Kasei) have withdrawn. The Feb. 3 Beppu-Oita Mainichi Marathon announced on Jan. 16 that London Olympics marathon 6th-placer and 2:08:53 man  Kentaro Nakamoto  (Team Yasukawa Denki) will head the elite field for its 62nd running.  Japan's most stable and successful current male marathoner, Nakamoto said in pre-race comments that he hopes to score his first marathon win on home Kyushu ground in Beppu-Oita, and with the race's results counting toward 2013 World Championships team selection the win would strengthen the position his strong Olympic showing has already given him.  Nakamoto's toughest domestic competition will come from the ever-popular Yuki Kawauchi  (Saitama Pref.) in his second marathon of the year, and from Masashi Hayashi  (Team Yakult) who broke 2:10 for the first time at last spring's Lake Biwa Mainichi Marathon just over a minute behind Nak...

by Brett Larner Japan's premier ultramarathon, the Lake Saroma 100 km and 50 km , saw its 27th running on Sunday, June 24. The 100 km was largely a battle of familiar faces on both the men's and women's sides, as national team stalwart and 2011 4th-placer Yoshikazu Hara moved up to take the win over last year's runner-up Hideo Nojo in 6:33:32.  Nojo improved on last year's mark but was still over two minutes behind Hara, running 6:35:52. In the women's race defending champion Naomi Ochiai was only 4th in 7:56:42, but 2011 runner-up   Shiho Katayama took over 20 minutes off her time from last year to win in a world-leading 7:33:38.  Last year's 50 km division winner and former corporate marathoner Yuka Ezaki made a good transition to the 100 km distance, finishing 5th in 8:04:02. The most surprising action came in the 50 km, where 25-year-old  Chiyuki Mochizuki (Canon AC Kyushu), the two-time Beppu-Oita Mainichi Marathon women's division winn...

by Brett Larner This weekend marks the 60th anniversary of one of Japan's oldest and most respected marathons, the Beppu-Oita Mainichi Marathon , usually abbreviated to Betsudai in Japanese. Betsudai has been the site of many historic performances, including Toru Terasawa 's 2:15:16 world record in 1963, Shigeru Soh 's 2:09:06 world record near-miss in 1978, Kodo drummer Kiyoko Obata 's 2:48:52 in 1979 to become the first recorded Japanese woman to complete a marathon in Japan, American Dick Beardsley 's 1981 battle against the Soh twins , future Barcelona Olympic silver medalist and Samuel Wanjiru coach Koichi Morishita 's 2:08:53 debut marathon national record in 1991, Yoshihisa Hosaka 's pair of 60+ world records in 2009 and 2010, and more. Last year on a new, purportedly faster, course, Australian debutant Jeff Hunt turned what would have been a garden-variety 2:10-2:11 pack race into something unforgettable with a thrilling charge up from the second p...

http://www.sanspo.com/sports/news/100228/spg1002281524006-n1.htm http://www.sanspo.com/sports/news/100228/spg1002281522005-n1.htm translated and edited by Brett Larner Former marathon national record holder Atsushi Fujita (Team Fujitsu) ran 1:29:46 to win the Kumanichi 30 km Feb. 28 in Kumamoto, Kyushu. 2nd was Hirokatsu Kurosaki (Team Konica Minolta) in 1:30:10, with Tsuyoshi Ugachi (Komazawa Univ.) 3rd. Fujita led from the start, varying his pace to throw his competitors off and putting in a long spurt at 24 km to dispatch Kurosaki and Ugachi. In the women's race Chiharu Matsuo (Team Kyudenko) took her 2nd straight title, running 1:50:18. Fujita plans to go for a fast time at December's Fukuoka International Marathon with an aim toward making the London Olympics in 2 years. "Today's 30 km was for the marathon," Fujita told reporters, "so I ran it as if I still had to run 12 km more once I finished. Everything checked out well." 2010 Kumanichi 30 km - T...

http://kumanichi.com/fsports/30km/index.cfm http://kumanichi.com/fsports/30km/30km52/20080225.1.cfm http://kumanichi.com/fsports/30km/30km52/20080225.2.cfm http://kumanichi.com/fsports/30km/30km52/20080225.3.cfm translated and edited by Brett Larner On Feb. 24 individual entrant Masaki Shimojo (Team Konica Minolta) won the 52nd Kumanichi 30 km Road Race in Kumamoto in 1:30:33. He became only the 3rd individual entrant to ever win the event, the last being Tomoya Shimizu (Team Sagawa Express) 2 years ago. Only 2 women were entered in the race, but winner Miho Notagashira (Team Wacoal) set a new course record by 13 seconds, running 1:44:00. Although windy conditions prevented a predicted 1:29 finish time, the men's race yielded the first dead heat finish in years. It started with a slow pace. At the 10 km point, Kodai Tanabe (Team Mazda) broke from the lead pack and opened a gap, but at the halfway point it looked likely that the finish time would be in the 1:33 range. The chase...