japan running news

Keita Sato , holder of the high school national records for 1500 m (3:37.18), 3000 m (7:50.81) and 5000 m (13:31.19), has moved into the team dorm at Komazawa University following his graduation from Kyoto's Rakunan H.S. Sato will start classes at Komazawa in April. Packing his hopes and dreams into a suitcase for the trip up to Tokyo, Sato was unfazed by the three-hour shinkansen trip. "I went on longer trips than this for training camps in high school," he said. "This isn't that long." Sato's roommate at Komazawa will be Ibuki Kaneko , who ran well on the uphill Fifth Stage at the Hakone Ekiden and is starting his third year in April. Assigned to mentor is Kotaro Shinohara , just finishing his own first year, who beat Sato by one place at February's National Cross Country Championships. Shinohara welcomed the team's new recruit. "Sato's really strong," he said. "I'll have to work hard to not get beaten." As the ol...

Nanaka Yonezawa showed incredible growth during her three years at Miyagi's Sendai Ikuei H.S. , and with her graduation she's now poised to go to the next level. Her first and third years at Sendai Ikuei its girls' team won the National High School Ekiden, she was 2nd in the National Track and Field Championships 1500 m in 2020, and she was the top-placing Japanese athlete in the 1500 m and 3000 m at last year's National High School Track and Field Championships. All that is more than enough to cement her place as the leader of her generation. In April Yonezawa will enter national champion Meijo University , but before she goes she talked about her memories of her three years of high school and her ambitions for the future. Originally from Shizuoka, Yonezawa travelled over 500 km to attend Sendai Ikuei. There she focused on the 1500 m and 3000 m, setting bests of 4:14.74 and 8:59.97, as well as a 5000 m best of 15:31.33. All three times put her in Japan's all-time...

The Hokuren Federation of Agricultural Cooperatives has announced that it's women's running team will be disbanded in March, 2023 at the end of the 2022-23 season. Founded in 1987, the Hokuren team qualified for the National Corporate Women's Ekiden 26 times and produced notable athletes including Yukiko Akaba , a 2008 Olympian in the 5000 m and 10000 m. It failed to make last year's National Corporate Women's Ekiden, finishing 29th at the qualifying race. In addition to competing in races, the team regularly held educational session and running events for school children and the general public to help contribute to society by spreading the love of the sport. Its activities will remain unchanged during the 2022-23 season and will still compete as usual. It will also continue to support the Hokuren Distance Challenge series of track meets held across Hokkaido every summer. source article: https://news.yahoo.co.jp/articles/32a9115eac6fa7fc2d7ac2b2a8442e4a76c21e8d tra...

The Tokyo Marathon returned to the streets of the nation's capital Sunday with both a mass participation field of 20,000 and a world-class elite race for the first time in three years. Three of the four divisions in the race had the world record holder in their respective category, and all three put in dominant performances to take the win.  Men's wheelchair marathon world record holder and double Paralympic gold medalist Marcel Hug  of Switzerland soloed a 1:22:16 to beat Japanese national record holder Tomoki Suzuki  by almost 7 minutes. Men's marathon world record holder Eliud Kipchoge  delivered one of the best performances of his career, taking command before all the pacers had dropped and pushing through headwinds over the final kilometers to win in 2:02:40, the 3rd-fastest record-legal time ever, fastest on Japanese soil, and fastest so far this year. And that despite a wrong turn when the police guide escort went the wrong way on a new section of course near...

Bigger things are happening in the world right now, but this Sunday the  Tokyo Marathon  returns to the streets with a full-sized elite and mass participation field for the first time since 2019. World record holders Brigid Kosgei  and Eliud Kipchoge  are there to lead it, broadcast live in 160 countries worldwide starting at 9:00 a.m. local Japan time with JRN's Brett Larner  on the commentary once again. Follow the leaderboard here , with athlete tracking here . For the second time in its history Tokyo has a significant course change this year, the addition of a new out-and-back toward Ueno just before 10 km and an equivalent cut from the final out-and-back toward Shinagawa. Not counting the triangular turnaround at Asakusa, that means Tokyo has gone from one 180˚ turn on the original course to two on the interim course to three on this course, something that will impact its overall quality and especially so for the wheelchair marathoners. The women's wheelch...

https://www.maurten.com/articles/a-kengo-suzuki-story An interview and photo essay with Japanese men's national record holder Kengo Suzuki  ahead of Sunday's Tokyo Marathon , by JRN's Mika Tokairin . Photos by Kaoru Fukui .

https://www.triathlete.com/culture/people/hiromu-inada-will-attempt-to-be-the-first-90-year-old-to-finish-kona/ An interview with Hiromu Inada , the oldest-ever Ironman World Championships finisher, by JRN's Mika Tokairin  in Triathlete magazine ahead of his attempt to become the first person aged 90+ to finish in Kona.

Hi, I'm Ayumu Kobayashi . Today I'm going to write about this year's National Corporate Half Marathon and the training I did for it. I hope other runners will find it even a little bit helpful. At the Corporate Half on Feb. 13 I was 10th in 1:00:44. My goal had been to run 61 minutes, so I hit that target. My Training Menu In January I ran a total of 681 km. Key workouts: Jan. 11: 1000 m x 5 at 2:50/km Jan. 12: 22.5 km Jan. 15: 9 km variable pace Jan. 17: 25 km Jan. 24: 1000 m x 8 at 2:52/km Jan. 27: 1 km + 4 km + 2 km Jan. 30: 16 km at 3:18/km avg. In January I was tired from the New Year Ekiden and had some knee pain after it, so I just jogged for 10 days until I started doing workouts again on the 11th. That's why I only ran 681 km for the month. But even on the jog days I was aware that I had the Corporate Half coming up, so I was doing around 30 km. It's pretty meat and potatoes, but I think it was really important. February (training for the 10 days before...