japan running news

A close 2nd at December's National High School Ekiden , 90% of the members of the five-time national champion Omuta H.S. team in Fukuoka will transfer to Tottori Johoku H.S. in Tottori at the start of the new school year next month. The mass transfer comes as a backlash against Omuta's treatment of head coach Ken Akaike , 52, with most team members and parents choosing to continue running under Akaike following his move to Johoku. Akaike had resigned as head coach at Omuta in March, 2023 after it came out that he had used corporal punishment on team members. But many team members at the time and their parents asked him to continue, and he returned to a coaching position at the school after undergoing training. Effectively serving as head coach, he led the team at last December's National High School Ekiden where they finished 2nd in a close-fought battle that went all the way to the end. According to multiple sources, in November the month before the National High School ...

Future Hakone Ekiden stars and current corporate league coaches Yasuyuki Watanabe and Daisuke Isomatsu on the 10.0 km First Stage of the 1991 National High School Ekiden Championships.

Konica Minolta team members Hiroyuki Yamamoto and Tomohiro Tanigawa are training on the island of Miyako in preparation for the Marathon Grand Championship (MGC) race, the official qualifying race for the Japanese Tokyo Olympics marathon team. The pair selected Miyako for their base training to get acclimated to the hot and humid conditions expected at the Sept. 15 MGC Race. Yamamoto graduated from Kawaguchi Kita H.S. and Toyo University before joining Konica Minolta. His PBs include 13:45.43 for 5000 m and 2:09:12 for the marathon. Tanigawa went to Kumamoto Kogyo H.S. and Takushoku University, signing on to the Konica Minolta team after his graduation. He has run 13:51.09 for 5000 m and 2:11:39 for the marathon. The two athletes, head coach Daisuke Isomatsu and other staff members have been on the island since May 27. It is their first time training there. Each day's training is split into three workouts, one each in the early and late morning and another in the afternoo...

http://sportsnavi.yahoo.co.jp/other/athletic/text/201106070002-spnavi_1.html translated and edited by Brett Larner JRN's favorite performance of Ugachi's, even though this clip is missing the best head-to-head action. Ugachi, in purple and white, smashes star frosh Akinobu Murasawa, in pale blue, on the Second Stage of the 2009 National University Ekiden. From last year through this spring, three men have been leaving a fresh, new impression on Japanese men's distance running with their aggressive, active racing in their first year as pros. From 2007 through 2010 the trio formed the spearhead of Komazawa University's Hakone Ekiden-winning squad: Tsuyoshi Ugachi (Team Konica Minolta), Yusuke Takabayashi (Team Toyota) and Takuya Fukatsu (Team Asahi Kasei). At last June's Hokuren Distance Challenge Fukagawa Meet 10000 m, Ugachi challenged the authority of the Kenyans in the race with a 28:01.54 PB. He then finished 12th at the World Half Marathon Championships wi...