japan running news

by Brett Larner click here for photos of the race With ideal weather across most of the country, Kenyans Dishon Karukuwa (Team Aisan Kogyo) and Titus Waroru (Chinzei Gakuin H.S.) ran through light rain to take down the course records in the men's half marathon and high school boys' 10 km divisions at the 62nd running of the Kanaguri Hai Tamana Half Marathon Mar. 6 in Tamana, Kumamoto. Back on the roads after running January's Osaka International Women's Marathon, last year's runner-up Hiroko Miyauchi (Team Kyocera), one of the nine Japanese women training in Christchurch, New Zealand at the time of the recent major earthquake, took the women's 10 km by a wide margin. The 19 year-old Karukuwa ran 1:02:20 to break the standing half marathon course record by 18 seconds. He was the first Kenyan winner in Tamana history and only the third non-Japanese to ever take the title. Runner-up Yukinobu Nakazaki (Team Toyota Kyushu) ran a strong 1:03:09, fast enough to...

http://www.47news.jp/CN/201102/CN2011021301000297.html http://www.saga-s.co.jp/news/saga.0.1825468.article.html translated and edited by Brett Larner At the 51st Karatsu 10 Mile Road Race , Feb. 13 in Karatsu, Saga, Yuki Iwamoto (Team Mazda) ran 47:20 to take his first win at the race. Known as the "God of the Mountain" during his Hakone Ekiden days at Juntendo University, Masato Imai (Team Toyota Kyushu) was 3rd, while 2004 Athens Olympics 10000 m runner and 2008 Karatsu winner Ryuji Ono (Team Asahi Kasei) finished only 26th. In the women's 10 km, Fumiko Hashimoto (Team Shimamura) won in 33:18, while Athens Olympics marathon 7th placer Naoko Sakamoto (Team Tenmaya) finished 18th. Akira Iwasaki (Tosu Kogyo H.S.) won the high school boys' 10 km in a PB of 30:04, while Sayaka Nishimura (Kawatana H.S.) won the high school girls' 5 km in 17:18. 2011 Karatsu 10-Mile Road Race click here for complete results Men's 10 Miles 1. Yuki Iwamoto (Team Mazda) - 47:20...

by Brett Larner The 22nd running of the Hokkaido Marathon takes place on Aug. 31 in Sapporo, Hokkaido. Historically a hot race, this year's event comes just a week after the Beijing Olympics and features a relatively limited field. In the men's race, last year's champion Julius Gitahi of Team Nissin Shokuhin will return to defend his title. Gitahi, a track Olympian for his native Kenya, won last year's race in his marathon debut, running 2:17:26 in conditions of extreme heat and humidity. He went on to run 2:08:57 and take 3rd in the 2008 Tokyo Marathon. Gitahi's biggest challenger will be his Nissin teammate Yuzo Onishi, who set a personal best of 2:08:54 at the 2008 Biwako Mainichi Marathon. With the nearly identical times run by both athletes this year, the potential is there for a major duel between the two teammates. Other contenders in the field include 2005 Brecia Marathon winner Richard Maiyo (Kenya), 2006 Warsaw Marathon winner Vitaliy Shafar (Ukraine), an...