japan running news

A group of Japanese university runners competed in the Zevenheuvelenloop 15 km road race in the Netherlands on Nov. 17. Every year a group of students is selected to compete based on their results at the National University Half Marathon and National University Track and Field Championships 10000 m. Having won both the Izumo Ekiden and National University Ekiden this season, Koku Gakuin University was out in force in the men's race too. Rui Aoki was part of a 5-way sprint finish for 2nd behind Ugandan Jacob Kiplimo 's 40:42 world best, taking 4th in 43:23, the best-ever Japanese men's performance at the race. Aoki won this year's National University Half Marathon in 1:02:06. He was 3rd on the First Stage at October's Izumo Ekiden and 7th on the Second Stage at the National University Ekiden, playing a key role in KGU's wins at both. His teammate Hikaru Tsujihara was 10th in 43:55, having handled the Third Stage at both Izumo and Nationals. Hinata Shirakawa ...

Sunday's Morinomiyako Ekiden in Sendai is one of the two big national-level ekidens on the collegiate women's ekiden circuit. This is the era of Meijo University , who have won the last seven Morinomiyako titles and the last six at December's Mt. Fuji. Women's Ekiden , and just about the only real story here is whether anyone can stop them. Five out the six members of last year's winning team, Nanaka Yonezawa , Kaede Rikimaru , Asuka Ishimatsu , Saki Harada , and Nanase Tanimoto , are back, and the only one missing, 2nd-year Naru Yabutani , finished the lowest on the team on her stage at 4th last time. Tanimoto, the only 4th-year on the team, has had more downs than ups this season, but that was true last year too and Meijo came through. Perpetual 2nd-placer Daito Bunka University was only 52 seconds behind over the 38.0 km Morinomiyako course, and that was with one of its runners finishing only 12th on her stage. Its entire 2023 lineup is back, led by 2nd-year S...

Daito Bunka University 1st-year Mariya Noda won a tight three-way battle over the last km to win the 2024 National University Women's Half Marathon title Sunday in Matsue. After a slow start with almost 40 athletes going through 5 km in 17:22, the pace built steadily with 17:14 and 16:41 splits over the middle part of the race. By 20 km it was down to just Noda, newcomer Mahiru Kobayashi of Osaka Gakuin University , last year's 5th-placer Nanase Tanimoto from national champion Meijo University and corporate leaguer Shiho Tachizako from Tenmaya , with 2023 3rd-placer Saki Harada drifting 9 seconds back in 5th. Noda ramped the pace up to 3:08 for the final km, dropping Tachizako, then Tanimoto, and finally Kobayashi to win by 2 seconds in 1:12:01. Kobayashi was next in 1:12:03, holding Tanimoto back to 3rd in 1:12:05. The top 6 were all under 1:13, with 17 women under 1:15 and 24 under 1:16. 45th Matsue Ladies Half Marathon National University Women's Half Marathon Mat...

The thing about dynasties is that sooner or later they're going to end. From 2003 to 2016 Kyoto's Ritsumeikan University won the Morinomiyako National University Women's Ekiden ten times and took 2nd the four times they didn't. But in 2017 Nagoya's Meijo University arrived on the scene and has won every year since then, its current streak of six national titles longer than Ritsumeikan's longest uninterrupted streak. Meijo holds the overall record of 2:02:57 for the 6-stage, 38.1 km course, slightly edited to 38.0 km this year, and its runners hold four of the six individual stage records. It keeps graduating top talent, most recently joint Third Stage CR record holders Narumi Kobayashi and Yuma Yamamoto , but head coach Katsuro Yoneda just keeps finding the top talent and helping it develop. But this season Meijo has been looking a little shaky. Out of last year's lineup, Fourth Stage CR breaker Nanase Tanimoto was 7th in last month's National Univ...

  Osaka Geijutsu University performing arts major Hikaru Kitagawa kicked off the final day of the Chengdu World University Games with the first Japanese women's gold medal of the games in athletics, winning the half marathon in 1:13:17 by 14 seconds over Turkey's Yayla Kilic Gonen . And winning it in style. 3 seconds behind Kilic Gonen at 20 km, Kitagawa closed from there to the finish in 3:08, or 2:51/km pace, the kind of split you'd more often see in a men's race. You have to wonder if the 20 km split was accurate, but anyway Kitagawa made up 17 seconds in 1.0975 km, which is pretty good. Fatma Karasu made it a Turkish 2-3 with a 1:14:28 for bronze. Rio Einaga of Osaka Gakuin University was 8th in 1:15:34 and national champion Meijo University's Saki Harada 14th in 1:16:36, enough to land Japan the team silver behind Turkey. China took the team bronze. Japanese men usually dominate the World University Games half marathon given their focus on that distance for...