by Brett Larner There’s no getting around the hard facts: 2009 was one of the worst years in the modern history of Japanese men’s marathoning. In a time when the world standard has undergone remarkable improvement with the ten fastest times of the year under 2:06 for the first time, Japanese men took a large step backwards. Only one Japanese man, Atsushi Sato (Team Chugoku Denryoku), broke 2:10 this year, the first time this has happened since 1996. The average of the top ten Japanese times of the year, 2:11:21, was also the slowest since 1996. Relative to the world top ten average, 2:05:13, the year was Japan’s worst-ever. To be fair, Japan did manage to take the team bronze medal at the Berlin World Championships, and all three of this year’s major Japanese spring marathons suffered windy conditions, in the case of March’s Tokyo Marathon verging on the extreme. There have also been troughs in the record before when the aging stars of one generation pass their prime before the next h...
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