japan running news

  The 73rd Beppu-Oita Mainichi Marathon official website has been updated to announce that Hironori Kishimoto (GMO) has withdrawn from Sunday's race. Kishimoto, 24, ran a 2:08:38 debut at last year's Beppu-Oita to finish 3rd, earning him a prominent place in this year's field. Along with Kishimoto, #3-ranked Yohanes Ghebregergis of Eritrea has also pulled out with injury. source article: https://www.rikujyokyogi.co.jp/archives/160541 translated by Brett Larner

With just over 2 weeks to go the Feb. 2 Beppu-Oita Mainichi Marathon has finally announced its elite field. It looks pretty good at the front end at first glance, but #1-ranked Vincent Kipchumba hasn't finished a marathon since his 2:04:28 best in London 4 years ago and has only run one race, a 29:05 10 km in 2023. #2-ranked Kiyoto Hirabayashi of Koku Gakuin University , winner in Osaka last year in a collegiate and debut record 2:06:18, is very unlikely to actually start, and #3-ranked Yohanes Ghebregergis likewise hasn't run a marathon since his 2:06:28 best in 2021 and only a single half marathon, 1:02:15 last spring, since then. So, that leaves a pretty tasty matchup between 2021 Tokyo Olympics alternate Shohei Otsuka , 2:06:57, last year's winner Derese Workneh , 2:07:58 in his Beppu-Oita victory, and Tesfahun Akalnew , 2:07:59. Another 5 people are at the 2:08 level, and then there are a truckload of 1:01 half marathoners taking a shot at the marathon distance. Ru...

It's a rare year that there's no wind at all at the Beppu-Oita Mainichi Marathon , and the field took advantage of it with a pack run that lasted until the very last stage of the race. It really was a race of pure attrition, steady between 2:07:15 and 2:07:30 pace as it shook down from a lead group of over 30 to just 8 by the time the last two pacers stopped at 30 km: Japanese runners Yuta Shimoda (GMO), Hironori Kishimoto (GMO), Tomoki Yoshioka (Kyudenko), Takanori Ogata (Toyota Kyushu) and Yuichi Yasui (Toyota), former Takushoku University captain Workneh Derese (Ethiopia/Hiramatsu Byoin), and internationals Ben Preisner (Canada) and Hicham Laqouahi (Morocco). Their split of 1:30:31 put Preisner 39 seconds up on Cam Levins ' 30 km NR and on track for 2:07:19, 51 seconds under the Paris Olympics qualifying time. Shimoda took over once the pacers were out, a 2:59 for the 31st km enough to get rid of Ogata and Yasui. Yoshioka was next, and just past 32 km Laquoahi dr...

Riding the momentum of its Day One win yesterday, Komazawa University dominated Day Two of the 99th Hakone Ekiden for the overall win. Combined with its CR wins at the Izumo Ekiden and National University Ekiden, the Hakone victory made Komazawa only the 5th school to score the triple crown of major ekiden wins in a single season. It was the first triple crown of head coach Hiroaki Oyagi 's career, his biggest achievement at the biggest road race in the world, the one that has eluded him for decades. And, with his post-race announcement that he will step back from his role as head coach, it was his last. Komazawa started Day Two with a 30-second lead over last year's 6th-placer Chuo University and 2:03 over 2022 Hakone champ Aoyama Gakuin University . Following the success of 1st-year Takuma Yamakawa on the uphill 5th leg yesterday, Oyagi opted to put 1st-year Aoi Ito on the steep downhill 6th leg. Ito excelled, outrunning Chuo's Haruto Wakabayashi by 17 seconds to ...

The Kanto Region University Track and Field Championships returned to Tokyo's National Stadium Thursday for the first of four straight days in its 101st edition. Favorite Noah Kiplimo (Nihon Yakka Univ.) won the meet's first track final, taking the D2 men's 10000 m in 28:28.58. Kiplimo led most of the race, alternating first with Kiyoto Hirabayashi (Koku Gakuin Univ.) and then Kotaro Shinohara (Komazawa Univ.) before pulling away with only Hironori Kishimoto (Aoyama Gakuin Univ.) and Patrick Kamau (Jobu Univ.) left behind him. The 1st-year Kamau couldn't match the two 4th-years' closing speed and dropped to the 3rd in 28:31.41, but Kishimoto nearly pulled off an upset as he took 2nd in 28:28.94. Hirabayashi and Shinohara dropped to 6th and 8th, but both went home with new PBs of 28:36.32 and 28:41.13. The women's 10000 m was pretty similar, with Mao Kuroda (Nittai Univ.) leading most of the way on 33 minute-high pace in a pack including teammate Momoko ...

The level at the Hakone Ekiden just keeps going up and up.  Every year it seems like it can't go any further, and then it does. 3 stages this year had new course records, 9 out of 10 legs had at least one all-time top 10 mark, and 4 stages had 4 times inside their best-ever 10. In the absolute sense, shoes have played a part in that over the last few years, but in a relative sense the best college teams have at least equalled the top of the corporate leagues, and the teams behind them are getting closer and closer to the same level. At this year's 98th running on Jan. 2 and 3  Aoyama Gakuin University broke its own course record to make it 6 wins in 8 years. AGU clocked 10:43:42 for the complete 10-stage, 217.1 km course, an average of 2:57.9/km the entire way. How does that compare to Honda , which won the New Year Ekiden corporate men's championships on Jan. 1? Honda ran 4:51:04 for the 7-stage, 100.0 km course, averaging 2:54.6/km over an average 14.3 km stage lengt...

Riding the momentum of its  Hakone Ekiden Day One win,   Aoyama Gakuin University  broke the Day Two and overall course records to take its sixth Hakone title in eight years. With all sixteen men on his entry roster having broken 29 minutes for 10000 m and even leaving some recent 62-minute half marathoners off, head coach Susumu Hara  had plenty of material to work with on the five-stage 109.6 km Day Two return trip from the mountain town of Hakone to central Tokyo. Handling the 20.8 km descent on the day's first leg, 4th-year Yuki Takahashi was the weakest link in the Day Two lineup in terms of finishing time on his individual stage, running only 8th-fastest, but even so he added a valuable 41 seconds to AGU's initial lead of 2:37. And from there it was a total blowout. Hironori Kishimoto  was the only runner to break 63 minutes on the 21.3 km 7th leg, taking the lead to 4:51. Issei Sato  lost 19 seconds to Juntendo University 's Masaki Tsuda  but ...

In the modern era of systematic mass-production of quality by dominant teams like Tokai University and Aoyama Gakuin University it has been years since an underdog came through with a surprise win on Japan's university men's ekiden circuit, but that's just what happened at today's Izumo Ekiden to kick off the 2019-20 Big Three University Ekiden season. The race was expected to be between defending champ Tokai and Buddhist powerhouse Komazawa University , with threats from AGU and fan favorites Toyo University . Like last year Tokai struggled a bit to get on its feet, lagging as a core leading quartet coalesced over the first half of the race's six stages. Running better than expected, #5-ranked Koku Gakuin University was right up in it along with AGU, Komazawa and Toyo, its second and third men Taiga Nakanishi and Yuhei Urano taking 3rd on their stages and Urano one of six men on the Third Stage to break its course record. The leading quartet broke up i...