It was a pale shadow of the results at the Keqiao Diamond League meet a day earlier, where Rachid Muratake was the only Japanese athlete in action at 3rd in 13.18 (+0.1) in the men's 110 mH, but the men's 3000 m at Sunday's Seiko Golden Grand Prix in Tokyo turned out to be the race of the meet. Collegiate 5000 m, 10000 m and half marathon record holder Richard Etir (Tokyo Kokusai Univ.) did pacing duty through 2000 m in 2:33 and 5:07, almost dead-even with Suguru Osako 's 2014-era NR of 7:40.09. When Etir stepped off Yu Shibata (Josai Univ.) stepped up as the surprise leader, pushing hard to keep the NR in range and dropping everyone except corporate leaguers Ryuto Igawa (Asahi Kasei) and Nagiya Mori (Honda). Both had the wheels to run Shibata down over the last 200 m, and Mori had the honor of becoming the first Japanese man under 7:40, winning in a new NR of 7:38.98. Igawa and Shibata both got there too, Igawa 2nd in 7:39.36 and Shibata 3rd in 7:39.51, the fast...
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