japan running news

  The 47th Kanagawa Half Marathon took place Sunday in Yokohama on a course starting and finishing outside the Nissin Oil Group's Isogo factory. First across the finish line was the winner of December's Fukuoka International Half Marathon and Aoyama Gakuin University  alumnus  Yuya Yoshida  (GMO), who clocked 1:02:12. Aoyama Gakuin 3rd-year  Shunya Udagawa  was next in a 1:02:20 PB, with Yusei Tomita  of Nihon University  3rd in 1:02:20 and  Yumiki Kunigo  setting a Heisei Kokusai University  school record 1:02:24 for 4th. Last year's Beppu-Oita Mainichi Marathon runner-up Yuta Shimoda , another Aoyama Gakuin graduate running for GMO, ran 1:02:43. Fresh off a 32:08 win in last week's Katsuta Marathon 10 km, Hakuho Joshi H.S.  3rd-year Jecinta Nyokabi  won the women's 10 km here too in 31:53. Elsewhere, Jun Kojima  of Ryutsu Keizai University  won the Moriya Half Marathon in Ibaraki in 1:03:48. Kana Numata ...

It's a rare year that there's no wind at all at the Beppu-Oita Mainichi Marathon , and the field took advantage of it with a pack run that lasted until the very last stage of the race. It really was a race of pure attrition, steady between 2:07:15 and 2:07:30 pace as it shook down from a lead group of over 30 to just 8 by the time the last two pacers stopped at 30 km: Japanese runners Yuta Shimoda (GMO), Hironori Kishimoto (GMO), Tomoki Yoshioka (Kyudenko), Takanori Ogata (Toyota Kyushu) and Yuichi Yasui (Toyota), former Takushoku University captain Workneh Derese (Ethiopia/Hiramatsu Byoin), and internationals Ben Preisner (Canada) and Hicham Laqouahi (Morocco). Their split of 1:30:31 put Preisner 39 seconds up on Cam Levins ' 30 km NR and on track for 2:07:19, 51 seconds under the Paris Olympics qualifying time. Shimoda took over once the pacers were out, a 2:59 for the 31st km enough to get rid of Ogata and Yasui. Yoshioka was next, and just past 32 km Laquoahi dr...

The fastest Japanese men's half marathon time of the weekend came overseas, where 2018 Fukuoka International Marathon winner Yuma Hattori followed up his New Year Ekiden-winning anchor run for Toyota with a 1:02:49 for 6th at the Santa Pola International Half Marathon in Spain almost 3 minutes behind winner Andamlak Belihu of Ethiopia. In a bit of synchronicity, 2020 Fukuoka winner Yuya Yoshida ran the fastest time of the weekend on home soil, outrunning GMO teammate Yuta Shimoda by 16 seconds to win Kumamoto's Okukuma Half Marathon in 1:03:07. Kazuto Kawabata (SGH) was 3rd in 1:03:26 as the only other runner to clear 64 minutes. Ibusuki Nanohana Marathon winner Yuki Kawauchi (ANDS) was in 27th at 5 km in 15:08 and faded a minute per 5 km from there to end up 37th in 1:10:17. Close behind him, women-only marathon NR holder Mao Ichiyama (Shiseido) had a surprisingly narrow win over relative unknown Yukari Nagatomo (Memolead) 1:12:26 to 1:12:38, Ichiyama's 3rd-st...

Entry lists are out for the Feb. 4 Beppu-Oita Mainichi Marathon . There's no separate women's entry list, but last year's 2nd and 3rd-placers Rieko Koshi and Hisae Yoshimatsu are both back and will probably go 1-2. The men's race has a small international contingent of Moroccans Mohamed Reda El Aaraby and Ayoub Dardar , Ethiopians Aychew Bantie and Workneh Derese , and Canadian Ben Preisner , with El Aaraby and Bantie setting up a potential 2:07 race for the Japanese crowd. Six Japanese men at the 2:07 to 2:08 level who have a realistic view of their chances of hitting the 2:05:50 standard to steal the 3rd spot on the Paris Olympic team in Osaka or Tokyo are on the list for Beppu-Oita, where a good run will earn them a trip to October's Chicago Marathon. Fumihiro Maruyama (Asahi Kasei) and Yuta Koyama (Toenec) are the fastest at 2:07:55 and 2:07:57 in Osaka the last two years, with Yuta Shimoda (GMO) leading the 2:08 quartet in 2:08:00 from Lake Biwa 2021. Su...

The Japanese women's 2022 season still has big races to come, with the Sanyo Ladies Road Race 10 km and half marathon this weekend and the Nittai University Women's Long Distance Time Trials on Dec. 24, but for men the top lists for the year are pretty much a done deal barring something unexpected at the Dec. 24-25 Heisei Kokusai University Time Trials or Dec. 29 Year End Half Marathon . We'll wait until after Nittai for our women's rankings, but as men from JHS to the corporate leagues do their final preparations for the four championship ekidens over the next three weekends here's how they shaped out in 2022. Update: Women's rankings are here . Indoor 5000 m NR holder Hyuga Endo (Sumitomo Denko) took the top spot on the strength of a single run, his all-time JPN #2 13:10.69 win against an incredibly deep field of Japan-based Kenyans at the May 4 Golden Games in Noboeka . That came less than a month after his 3:36.69 1500 m at the Kanakuri Memorial Meet , a...

Three Japanese athletes ran Sunday's Tartan Ottawa International Marathon in an effort to score qualifying marks for the 2023 MGC Race, Japan's marathon trials for the 2024 Paris Olympics. In the men's race, Yuta Shimoda (GMO) and Takumi Oishi (Suzuki) went with the leaders all the way until eventual winner Andualem Shiferaw (Ethiopia) made his move before 30 km. Shiferaw, the favorite with a best of 2:05:52, was stellar over the second half, going 1:03:52 / 1:02:12 to set a new course record 2:06:04 for the win. When Shiferaw attacked, Oishi, coached by 2010 Ottawa winner Arata Fujiwara , immediately dropped off, ultimately finishing 8th in 2:15:50. Shimoda, who ran 2:08:35 at March's Tokyo Marathon and needed to run 2:11:25 here to qualify for the trials, hung on to 3rd, overtaken by Abdi Ali Gelchu (Bahrain) and dropping to 4th at one point but running down Leonard Langat (Kenya) just before the finish to retake 3rd. Yamaguchi went out in a pack of 6 women that...

Running with support from JRN, Takumi Oishi and Haruka Yamaguchi will be making their Canadian debuts at Sunday's Tartan Ottawa International Marathon . Japan's Olympic marathon trials are the hardest marathon in the world to qualify for, and both Oishi and Yamaguchi will be going for times that will help put them in position to make the September 2023 trials race. The auto-qualifier times for races outside Japan, 2:08:00 for men and 2:24:00, are pretty ambitious, but with an option for qualifying via a two-race average of 2:10:00 for men and 2:28:00 for women both Oishi and Yamaguchi will be aiming to get under those times in Ottawa before hitting a second race next winter. Oishi, a graduate of Josai University , was 4th on the Eighth Stage at the 2018 Hakone Ekiden. He now runs for the Suzuki corporate team alongside 2021 Fukuoka International Marathon winner Michael Githae . His coach at Suzuki is Arata Fujiwara , who won Ottawa in 2010 in 2:09:34, the first man to brea...

As the only game in town for its final running before being swallowed up by the Osaka Marathon 's platinum ambitions, the Feb. 28 Lake Biwa Mainichi Marathon has put together the best field in its history. Times in the last three years don't mean what they used to, but even so Lake Biwa has 2 men sub-2:07, 7 sub-2:08, 13 sub-2:09, 25 sub-2:10, 40 sub-2:11 and 53 sub-2:12, all Japanese but one, Japan-based Kenyan Simon Kariuki  (Togami Denki).  Among them are 2:06 men Ryu Takaku  (Yakult) and Hiroto Inoue  (Mitsubishi Juko), half marathon national record holder Yusuke Ogura  (Yakult), 2019 Fukuoka winner Taku Fujimoto  (Toyota), Tokyo Olympics marathon trials winner Shogo Nakamura  (Fujitsu), 100 km world record holder Nao Kazami (Aisan Kogyo) and many, many more. And there are at least another 7 men with half marathon bests under 62 minutes making debuts or trying to finish a marathon for the first time, notably university ekiden star Shunya Kik...

2017 Ageo City Half Marathon winner Simon Kariuki (Nihon Yakka Univ.) ended 2018 with another win, beating former Aoyama Gakuin University and current GMO corporate team stars Tadashi Isshiki and Yuta Shimoda to win the 2nd edition of the Year-End Half Marathon . A new event started last year to give people whose teams missed out on the New Year and Hakone Ekidens something to do with their fitness, the Year-End Half Marathon course consisted of a short loop followed by four laps of around 5 km each inside western Tokyo's hilly Showa Kinen Park. Initially starting in a pack with others from the GMO and Raffine corporate teams and a few university men from Chuo, Asia and Meiji Gakuin, Kariuki and Shimoda pulled away over the second lap of the park with Isshiki trailing in a chase pack of four. Over the third lap Shimoda lost touch, then was overtaken by Isshiki midway through the final lap. Kariuki took the win with ease in 1:02:42, nearly two minutes better than last year...

Last year the Hokkaido Marathon saw the first pair of Japanese athletes qualify for the new MGC Race 2020 Olympic marathon trials event , with winners Honami Maeda (Tenmaya) and Akinobu Murasawa (Nissin Shokuhin) winning under the time standards they needed for MGC qualification. Since then the numbers have grown to 13 men and 6 women on the qualifier list with another 16 women and 34 men halfway there thanks to an option for qualifying via a two-race average time standard. As an August event Hokkaido is always on the hot side, but success there might predict success in Tokyo 2020 and easier time standards than any of the other domestic options for MGC qualification there's no shortage of top-level Japanese talent lining up to give it a go this year. The winning Japanese woman in Hokkaido will qualify for the MGC race if under 2:32:00, with up to 5 more qualifying if under 2:30:00. London World Championships team member Mao Kiyota (Suzuki Hamamatsu AC) leads the women's...

Along with the National Cross-Country Championships and Tokyo Marathon, the weekend saw competitive half marathons across the country and nearby in South Korea. Yuta Shimoda of four-time Hakone Ekiden champion Aoyama Gakuin University turned the fastest time of the weekend with a 1:03:20 win at the Kashima Yutoku Road Race half marathon, beating sometime training partner Aritaka Kajiwara (Hiramatsu Byoin) by 35 seconds. A week after his course record-breaking win at the Kitakyushu Marathon, Yuki Kawauchi (Saitama Pref. Gov't) won the local Fukaya City Half Marathon in Saitama in 1:04:26, beating corporate leaguer Rui Watanabe (Shindengen) by 29 seconds. Amateur Tomomi Sawahata (Sawahatters) scored yet another road race win in 1:15:42, the fastest time of the weekend by a Japanese woman. At the 40th anniversary running of the Inuyama Yomiuri Half Marathon , Toyo University first-year Ryoga Asai won in 1:04:44. Eri Watanabe (Aichi Denki) took the women's race i...

In a rare reversal of Day One standings, Aoyama Gakuin University ran down Toyo University early in on Day Two to win its fourth-straight Hakone Ekiden title. At both the Izumo Ekiden and National University Men's Ekiden this season, Toyo struggled to cope with the absence of its entire senior class due to injury, running up front much of the way but lacking the depth to keep the lead in the final stages. Hakone played out like an opera-scale version of the same familiar story, its brilliant Day One win backlit by the headlights of rapidly approaching fate. Second on Day Two's opening stage, the 20.8 km Sixth Stage with around 800 m elevation loss, both of the last two years, AGU 3rd-year Yuji Onoda just missed the course record en route as he ran down Toyo's Shunsuke Imanishi and put AGU almost a minute ahead by the time he handed off. AGU's next two runners Keisuke Hayashi and Yuta Shimoda both won their stages, Hayashi, a relative unknown on the roster, ru...

Entry lists are out for Japan's biggest and best road race, the Jan. 2-3 Hakone Ekiden . 21 university teams from around the Tokyo area will field ten runners from the sixteen on their entry list, each runner taking on roughly a half marathon length over the ten-stage race. 2017 Izumo Ekiden winner Tokai University is the class of the field, one of only five teams to enter all ten of its best athletes and the only one with ten-runner averages under 14 minutes for 5000 m, under 29 for 10000 m and 1:03 for the half marathon. At all three distances its averages are slightly better than Aoyama Gakuin University 's were last year when AGU won its third-straight Hakone title, and no other school even comes closer over the most relevant distance, the half marathon. It has never won Hakone, but this year it's Tokai's race to lose. AGU has been hit by injury troubles this year, losing in both Izumo and the National University Ekiden and missing several key members from ...

http://www.hochi.co.jp/sports/etc/20170208-OHT1T50033.html translated and edited by Brett Larner After running 2:11:34 at age 19 at last year's Tokyo Marathon to become the fastest-ever Japanese marathoner under 20, Aoyama Gakuin University third-year Yuta Shimoda has withdrawn from this year's Tokyo Marathon on Feb. 26 due to pain in his right knee.  Shimoda was set to try for the London World Championships men's marathon team in Tokyo, whose organizers made the announcement of his withdrawal on Feb. 7. Shimoda won the Hakone Ekiden Eighth Stage on Jan. 3 to help Aoyama Gakuin claim the overall title, his second-straight Hakone stage win.   On Jan. 15 he did a 2:27:35 marathon time trial on the last day of a three-day marathon training camp conceived by Aoyama Gakuin head coach Susumu Hara , 49, but after running the anchor stage of the National Men's Ekiden a week later on Jan. 22 he began to experience pain in his right knee. Shimoda will not run the fi...

http://www.hochi.co.jp/sports/etc/20170201-OHT1T50148.html translated by Brett Larner Tadashi Isshiki , star fourth-year at 2015-2017 Hakone Ekiden champion Aoyama Gakuin University , completed a 42.195 km training run Feb. 1 in Futtsu, Chiba.  Isshiki ran the first 40 km in 2:21:52, roughly 3:33/km, before picking up the pace to 2:52/km to complete the final 2.195 km in 6:18 for a total time of 2:28:10.  Aoyama Gakuin head coach Susumu Hara , 49, has placed a heavy emphasis on major acceleration after 40 km, but Isshiki looked fresh as he finished the run, laughing, "That was just jogging." Isshiki took part in Aoyama Gakuin's Jan. 13-15 marathon training camp in Futtsu but came down with a sore throat after the first day and dropped out. He soon recovered.  Planning to run the March 5 Lake Biwa Mainichi Marathon in a bid to make the London World Championships marathon team he faces rising expectations as Japan's #1 university runner. Also doing the 42.195...

http://www.hochi.co.jp/sports/feature/hakone/20170117-OHT1T50256.html translated by Brett Larner Four runners from Hakone Ekiden champion Aoyama Gakuin University including under-20 national record holder Yuta Shimoda , a third-year at Aoyama Gakuin, completed a three-day marathon training camp in Futtsu, Chiba from Jan. 13th to 15th.  Alongside them was Aritaka Kajiwara , 28, an unsponsored independent who ran the Hakone Ekiden for straight years as part of the Kanto Region Select Team while at Shoin University and who has trained with the Aoyama Gakuin ekiden team since last year. Kajiwara quit the Press Kogyo corporate team in 2015.  At December's Fukuoka International Marathon he ran a PB of 2:14:27.  He now plans to run both the Feb. 5 Beppu-Oita Mainichi Marathon and the Mar. 5 Lake Biwa Mainichi Marathon.  "I'll be going for 2:12 at Beppu-Oita and 2:10 at Lake Biwa," he said.  Aoyama Gakuin head coach Susumu Hara commented, "We're currently ...

http://www.hochi.co.jp/sports/etc/20170115-OHT1T50072.html http://www.nikkansports.com/sports/athletics/news/1765865.html translated and edited by Brett Larner Having won the January 2-3 Hakone Ekiden with an unprecedented “double triple,” victories at all three Big Three University Ekidens in a single season and three-straight Hakone titles, Aoyama Gakuin University ’s marathon training camp featuring under-20 marathon national record holder Yuta Shimoda (2:11:34, age 19) wrapped up Jan. 15 with a full marathon-length run in Futtsu, Chiba. The 42.195 km run was the last workout on the schedule of the three day, two night training camp. Two days earlier on the 13th the camp’s participants ran 32.195 km , a tough schedule coming just two weeks after Hakone. Shimoda ran the first 40 km of the final workout in 2:21:18, roughly 3:32 per km, before accelerating to 2:52 per km for the final 2.195 km. His total time for the run was 2:27:35. Aoyama Gakuin head coach Susumu Har...