japan running news

2019 African U18 3000 m champ Emmanuel Kiplagat (Mitsubishi Juko) led a 3-way sprint finish to break the meet record at the Hachioji Long Distance meet at Kanagawa's Gion Stadium Saturday, going under the 2023 Budapest World Championships standard for the first time in 27:07.59. 2nd-placer Benson Kiplangat (Subaru) also cleared the 27:10.00 Worlds standard in 27:09.83, 3rd-placer Samwel Masai (Kao) just missing in 27:10.06. With the WaveLight pacing system making its Japanese debut the Hachioji A-heat produced the deepest-ever 10000 m. The first 24 finishers cleared 28 minutes, breaking the previous world record of 21 set at last year's Hachioji meet. 12th-placer Takuya Hanyu (Toyota Boshoku) ran 27:27.49 to come in at all-time Japanese #4 and knock former NR holder Toshinari Takaoka out of the all-time top 10. Led by Takashi Nanba (Toenec) in 27:48.27, another 10 men were sub-28 in the B-heat including 2:06:35 marathoner Kyohei Hosoya (Kurosaki Harima), 9th in a PB 27:...

Temperatures in the single digits and strong winds held back people's chances of qualifying for next year's World Championships, but they couldn't stop this year's Hachioji Long Distance meet from delivering a piece of history. In the fastest of the meet's seven heats of 10,000 m,  Evans Keitany  (Toyota Boshoku) ran 27:28.25 for the win, edging 2nd-placer James Muoki  (Konica Minolta) by 0.24 seconds and 3rd-placer Samwel Masai  (Kanebo) by 0.52.  Behind them another 18 men broke 28 minutes for a total of 21, breaking the record of 20 set at the 2008 Beijing Olympics. 8 of the 21 men were Japanese, with Tatsuhiko Ito  (Honda) taking the top Japanese spot at 4th in 27:30.69 and Tomoki Ota (Toyota) breaking through with a 27:33.13 PB for 5th. National record holder Akira Aizawa  (Asahi Kasei) was 20th in 27:58.35. And it didn't stop there. In the final heat marathoner Hiroto Inoue  (Mitsubishi Juko) ran a 13-second PB of 27:43.17 for the win, lea...

The 281st Nittai University Time Trial s in suburban Yokohama were the biggest track action of the weekend. In Saturday's men's 10000 m A-heat, Hitachi Butsuryu teammates Richard Kimunyan Yator and Jonathan Ndiku went head to head in hopes of showing their coach who's in better shape to run the international stage at the Jan. 1 New Year Ekiden. With the thousands of dollars in income that can mean to whoever gets picked on the line, Kimunyan, who set a PB and MR of 27:01.42 in winning September's National Corporate Championships, and Ndiku, who ran a PB 27:07.29 to win September's Tokai University Time Trials, went right to the end. Kimunyan got there first in 27:01.74, Ndiku less than a step behind in a PB 27:01.95. Good luck to their coach in picking who to go with for January's main event. A lap back, 18-year-old Chuo University first-year Yamato Yoshii added to this season's U20 Japanese national record 13:28.31 for 5000 m and Asian U20 half marat...