japan running news

  After three days of athletics competition at the Hangzhou Asian Games Japan has yet to score gold, but its haul of silver and bronze medals more than doubled over the course of the two days. Men's 400 m NR holder Kentaro Sato took silver Saturday, starting slow as Fuga Sato did the leading in the first half of the race, then reeling in the competition over the last 120 m. Asian record holder Yousef Ahmed Masrahi of Saudi Arabia got away from him, just, winning gold in 45.55 with Sato in 45.57. Bahraini Abbas Yusuf Ali knocked Fuga Sato off the podium with a PB 45.65, Fuga 4th in 45.70. It took til Sunday night for the next medal to land, with Ryoma Aoki and Seiya Sunada going 2-3 in the men's 3000 m steeplechase. Favorite Avinash Mukund Sable of India took it out fast with a 2:40.97 first 1000 m, too fast to sustain but enough to set put him far out front for most of the race. Sable led at 2000 m with 5:27.48 before starting to fade, giving Aoki hope as he closed har...

We'd like to give you preview and streaming info for the Asian Athletics Championships starting tomorrow in Bangkok, Thailand, but there's not a lot to go on. Streaming should be here under the "Live" tab , but as the JAAF site notes , "There's a chance a link to streaming might be released right before the start. If one is announced, we'll let you know." 42 countries are set to compete, but no overall entry lists have been made public anywhere we've looked. The Asian Athletics Association site isn't very helpful either, its top story being the federation bureaucrats' "Gala and Awards Celebration for the 50th Anniversary of Asian Athletics Association" and almost nothing about its championships apart from a statistics PDF that starts off with a long autobiography by an AAA exec. The meet schedule is up and it has links to event start lists, but nothing has been added there yet. So, about all we can tell you right now is about...

After losing most of last year to a hernia, Abdul Hakim Sani Brown (Tumbleweed TC) was back, winning the 100 m national title for the third time in his career on Day 2 of the 2022 National Track and Field Championships Friday in Osaka. After running 10.11 in the heats and then clearing the 10.05 standard with a 10.04 in the semifinals, Sani Brown overcame a slow start to run down Ryuichiro Sakai (Osaka Gas) and Hiroki Yanagita (Toyo Univ.) for the win in 10.08 (+1.1). With a top 3 finish and the standard his place on the Oregon World Championships team is guaranteed, but in his post-race interview he said he was disappointed at the weakness of his performance in the final and promised he'd better it at Worlds. Sakai continued his rise through the ranks of Japanese sprinting with a PB 10.10 for 2nd, with 18-year-old Yanagita not quite matching his run in the semis but still impressive at 10.19 for 3rd. Olympic team members Yuki Koike (Sumitomo Denko) and Yoshihide Kiryu (Niho...

Friday is Day 2 of Japan's National Track and Field Championships at Osaka's Yanmar Stadium Nagai. Streaming starts at 11:25 a.m. local time and run through 6:30 p.m. before switching over to broadcaster NHK. The daily schedule is here , with start lists here . On the track the main event is the men's 100 m final. Abdul Hakim Sani Brown  (Tumbleweed TC) is the only man in the race to have cleared the 10.05 Oregon World Championships standard with a 10.04 (+0.8) in the semifinals. Yuki Koike (Sumitomo Denko), Ryuichiro Sakai (Osaka Gas) and 18-year-old Hiroki Yanagita (Toyo Univ.) all ran 10.13~10.16 in the semis, and former NR holder Yoshihide Kiryu (Nihon Seimei) made it through in 10.24. Sani Brown will need to make top 3 for the JAAF to pick him for sure, but with any luck we'll see a few others hit the standard in the final to fill up the slots. The women's 100 m final is close, Midori Mikase (Sumitomo Denko), Mei Kodama (Mizuno), Arisa Kimishima (DK Sh...