by Brett Larner For the second-straight year, Shinji Nakadai (Harriers AC) was the top Japanese man at the IAU 100 km World Championships, held this year in Winschoten, Netherlands. The defending individual men's world champion, Nakadai made no attempt to follow the reckless early pace set by eventual winner Giorgio Calcaterra , who averaged as fast as 3:42/km in the first stages of the race. Neither did any of the other athletes in the field, as Calcaterra took the world title by a margin of over 15 minutes. The strong American squad kept three men in the top pack throughout the race and ended up taking the individual silver and bronze medals as well as team gold led by veteran Michael Wardian . Nakadai faded after 80 km, taking 5th in 6:48:32, but thanks in large part to a solid 10th-place run by teammate Yoshiki Takada Japan was able to nail down the team silver medal by just 1:51 over Calcaterra's Italy squad which went home with bronze. The w...
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