japan running news

One of the Tokyo area's most popular races, the Ome 30 km and 10 km Road Race has long had a relationship with the U.S.A.'s Boston Marathon with top-placing runners from each event being invited to the other. For the first time in recent memory Ome will bring an American woman instead of a man. Off a 2:34:53 in Boston last year Danna Herrick will face 2015 Rotterdam Marathon winner and two-time Ome champ Asami Kato (Panasonic) and, fresh from  a win at Sunday's Osaka Half Marathon , Maki Ashi (Kyudenko) in her 30 km debut. On the men's side 2:12 marathoner Naoki Okamoto (Chugoku Denryoku) and the Koichi Morishita -coached Kento Otsu (Toyota Kyushu) top the bill. Track specialist Naohiro Domoto (JR Higashi Nihon) and university men Daisuke Horiai (Komazawa University) and Kota Oki (Waseda University) round out the invited athlete list with their 30 km debuts, with deeper competition to be expected at the front end of the general division. The top Japanese f...

Riding a wave of rapid improvement since the start of the season, Kanagawa University pulled off a perfect race to beat favorites Tokai University and Aoyama Gakuin University and win its first National University Men's Ekiden Championships title since 1997 in one of the fastest times in event history. Tokai beat defending national champion AGU at last month's Izumo Ekiden , and today's race was expected to be another head-to-head. But on the opening stage both were far from the front-end action. Likewise for #3-ranked Yamanashi Gakuin University, still on the mend from injuries to many of its best runners. In the absence of the three favorites, #4 through #7-ranked teams Komazawa University , Kanagawa, Waseda University and Toyo University formed a leading group from which 2015 national champion Toyo emerged as the front runner. Tokai and AGU spent the next three stages working up to the lead group before both lost ground on the Fifth Stage and had to try to r...