japan running news

The Kobe Marathon happens Nov. 16 with a tweaked course that cuts out the unpopular bridge out to the finish, a change organizers are touting as making it a way faster course. There are some pretty good quality African athletes in the field, with top 2 men Abay Alemu and Elisha Rotich both in the 2:06:50 range in races last year, Alemu with a 2:06:50 for 2nd in Wuxi and Rotich 2:06:54 for 3rd in Paris, and Jackline Chelal dominating the women's field with a 2:20:29 win in Seville in 2023. Kobe is a shortcut for qualification for the MGC Race L.A. Olympic marathon trials, with one spot available to the top Japanese man if under 2:09:00 and the top Japanese woman if under 2:27:00. Only one athlete who looks capable of doing that has taken the bait, Masato Arao doubling back from a 2:07:42 for 6th at August's Sydney Marathon, a breakthrough run that wasn't enough for the JAAF to deign to let him into the Olympic trials. Yuma Morii , Hiromasa Kumahashi and Akihiro Kaneko ...

23-year-old Yuki Nakamura broke through to the upper levels of Japanese women's marathoning, taking over 6 minutes off her PB to win Australia's Gold Coast Marathon in a course record 2:24:22. Coming into the race with a best of only 2:30:31 from Nagoya in March, the night before the race Nakamura's coaching staff told JRN that her goal was to clear 2:26 and that she'd go with the lead group on 2:24 pace and see what she could do. Helped by a large group of men to break the wind, the pack of five soon shook down to just Nakamura, favorite Visiline Jepkesho of Kenya and 2:26 Ethiopian Sichala Kumeshi . Nakamura looked comfortable and under control, even like she was holding back, through the first 2/3 of the race. A move from Jepkesho before 30 km opened a 10 m gap between the two Africans and Nakamura, but Nakamura worked the small hill just after 31 km to catch back up and even go to the front. From there Nakamura threw in a series of surges, first breaking Kumeshi a...

With the deadline for qualification for the Oct. 15 MGC Race Olympic marathon trials coming right up, at Sunday's Tartan Ottawa International Marathon eleven Japanese men took a last shot at joining the 67 men and 29 women to have already qualified. Depending on how fast they had already run inside the qualifying window each of the eleven had an individual qualifying standard to run, ranging from 2:08:00 to 2:11:30. But with the difficulties of doubling after having already raced in February or March, long international travel, and hot conditions in the last half hour of the race, none succeeded in hitting their qualifying mark. Ryoma Takeuchi (ND Soft) and Ryo Osaki (Komori Corp.), who both ran 2:08 earlier this year and needed to run in the 2:11 range to make it, and 2:10 runner Chihiro Ono (GMO) lasted the longest, Takeuchi still on track at 35 km and Osaki and Ono right on the cusp at 30 km. But like winner Yihunilign Adane (Ethiopia), who dropped from 2:06 pace at 30 km t...

11 Japanese men are running Sunday's Tartan Ottawa International Marathon , the last race worldwide where Japanese athletes can qualify for October's MGC Race Olympic marathon trials before the May 31 deadline. Streaming starts at 6:30 a.m. local time on May 28, with the race kicking off at 7:00. Leaderboard and tracking are here , with the race app here . Four pacing groups are currently planned in Ottawa, the lead group going after last year's 2:06:04 CR, one group at 2:08:00 pace, one at 2:09:30, and one at 2:15:00. The Japanese men, who need to either run 2:08:00 or faster or have two races averaging 2:10:00 or better inside the qualifying window, will be split between the 2nd and 3rd groups. 67 men have already qualified, and if all goes well in Ottawa that number could end up over 70. A guide to the 11 runners and their target times is here . The complete elite men's field is here , and the women's field here . © 2023 Brett Larner, all rights reserved

The deadline for Japanese athletes to qualify for the MGC Race , Japan's Olympic marathon trials happening Oct. 15 in Tokyo, is May 31. Up to this point 67 men and 29 women have hit the tough qualifying standards that make the MGC Race the hardest marathon in the world to get into. That looks set to be the final number of women, but 11 men will be taking their last shot at making the cut at the May 28 Tartan Ottawa International Marathon . To get in they'll have to either walk away from Ottawa with an average of 2:10:00 or better between what they run there and one other race since the qualifying window opened on Nov. 1, 2021, or run 2:08:00 or faster in Ottawa. The 11 runners break down into four groups. At the top end, Ryo Osaki , Ryoma Takeuchi and Junnosuke Matsuo can all afford to run slower than what they already have in order to hit the 2:10:00 average. Osaki and Takeuchi both have a 2:08 race to their names inside the qualifying window and only need to run 2:11, but t...