japan running news

Japan's most obscure elite-level marathon, the Nobeoka Nishi Nippon Marathon has announced its elite field for its 57th running on Feb. 10. Generally a developmental-level race with winning times in the 2:11 to 2:13 range, Nobeoka serves as a springboard for early career marathoners to move on to bigger things. Which hasn't stopped local Ryoichi Matsuo (Asahi kasei) from making it an annual event on his calendar, with wins in 2016 and 2017 and 2nd-place in an exciting sprint finish last year. Matsuo is back again this year to try to become only the second man in the race's history to win it three times. His main competition is Josai University ekiden team assistant coach Shingo Igarashi , 2nd in Osaka last fall and racing Nobeoka after training run efforts at the Xiamen and Dubai marathons in January. With a 2:15:02 best in Tokyo two years ago Takuma Shibata (Komori Corp.) should also factor in. The most interesting first-timer is Masamichi Yasuda (Aichi Seiko), a ...

The year's international road racing circuit kicked off Sunday with two races in Asia featuring top-level Japanese athletes. At the C&D Xiamen Marathon in China, ten Japanese athletes ranked in the women's and men's Asian top 100 ran with support from JRN as part of Xiamen's bid to become the first race worldwide to qualify for the IAAF's new platinum road race label. 2016 Osaka Marathon winner and mother of three Yoshiko Sakamoto (Y.W.C.) placed highest among them, taking 7th in 2:39:00 with 2018 Osaka runner-up Haruka Yamaguchi (AC Kita)  9th in 2:42:39, 2017 Osaka winner Yumiko Kinoshita (Tokyo T&F Assoc.) 10th in 2:43:56, and 2018 Geneva Marathon runner-up Hisae Yoshimatsu (Shunan City Hall) 12th in 2:45:32. Running just two days after Josai University had a disappointing 20th-place finish at the Hakone Ekiden , its assistant coach Shingo Igarashi was the top-placing Japanese man at 15th in 2:20:45. Dejene Debele (Ethiopia) won the men'...

Moroccan Soud Kanbouchia took the top spot in Japan's second-biggest marathon Sunday, breaking the Osaka Marathon women's course record to win in 2:31:19. In the early going Kanbouchia had company from minor team corporate leaguers Hiroko Yoshitomi (Memolead) and Kasumi Yoshida (Nitori) on mid-2:27 pace, but with a surge at halfway she was on her own and stayed that way until the finish. Yoshitomi, this year's Boston Marathon 10th-place finisher who set a PB and CR of 2:30:09 two weeks ago at the Fukuoka Marathon and, incredibly, won the Ohtwara Marathon on Friday in 2:37:22, dropped off after 10 km to settle into mid-2:30s pace. Yoshida lasted longer but slowed dramatically after 25 km and was quickly retaken by Yoshitomi. But from the main pack of amateur women behind them club runner Haruka Yamaguchi (AC Kita) emerged to run both down, running almost even splits to take 2nd in 2:34:12, a PB by over 4 minutes. Yoshitomi hung on 3rd in 2:34:39, almost 3 minut...

One of the world's ten biggest marathons with nearly 30,000 finishers, his year's Osaka Marathon takes place Nov. 25. At the elite level Osaka has carved an interesting place for itself as a sort of unofficial amateur Japanese women's national championships, with just about all of Japan's sub-2:40 amateur women entered. 2017 winner Yumiko Kinoshita (Tokyo T&F Assoc.) leads 6 of last year's top 7 including Mitsuko Ino (Linkstyle), who finished just 1 second behind Kinoshita in the last edition, and 2016 Osaka winner Yoshiko Sakamoto (F.O.R.). But they have serious competition ahead of them this time in the form of quasi-corporate leaguer Hiroko Yoshitomi (Memolead), fresh from a 2:30:09 PB and CR win at the Nov. 11 Fukuoka Marathon , and 2:31:09 Moroccan Soud Kanbouchia . First-timer Felista Wambui (Kenya) is a wildcard. The high-volume racer Yoshitomi is the heavy favorite, the only question really being whether she can finally break 2:30 for the first t...

Akinobu Murasawa (Nissin Shokuhin) and Honami Maeda (Tenmaya) became the first athletes to qualify for the new MGC Race 2020 Olympic trials event , clearing the JAAF's hoops with PB runs in heat to win the 2017 Hokkaido Marathon. One of the most popular runners to come out of the current boom in university men's ekiden running, Murasawa had an unsuccessful marathon debut at Lake Biwa in March, up front until late but fading to 28th in 2:17:51. This time he stayed in the front pack through the slow opening going, ignoring a move by Shingo Igarahi (Josai Univ. Coaching Staff) and Kenichi Jiromaru (Raffine Coaching Staff) around the halfway point that put them over 30 seconds ahead. Part of a group of five who set off in pursuit at 30 km, Murasawa moved into the top spot just before 40 km and held it all the way to the finish to win in 2:14:48. As the first race at which Japanese men could qualify for the JAAF's new single-trial 2020 Olympic selection event Hokkaido...

by Brett Larner Japanese athletes raced in three European road races in three different countries on Sunday, 2015 Zurich Marathon winner Yoshiko Sakamoto (Y.W.C.) leading the way at Germany's Volksbank Muenster Marathon .  Starting off at a conservative pace that left her 20 seconds behind the lead group at 5 km and over a minute and a half behind by 15 km, over the second half she overtook three women, Ethiopian Belaynesh Yigezu , then Kenyans Janet Cheruiyot and Salina Jebet , to move into 2nd.  2015 Nairobi Marathon winner Elizabeth Rumokol of Kenya, the only woman in the field to have broken 2:30, took 1st in 2:33:01, Sakamoto next in 2:38:46 and Jebet 3rd in 2:42:27.  "I wanted to try to run with the lead group, but they went out too fast," Sakamoto said post-race.  "I was hoping for a faster time but I'm really, really happy to have gotten 2nd.  This was the first time I've ever enjoyed myself while racing seriously." In the Muesnter men...

by Brett Larner Germany's Volksbank Muenster Marathon celebrates its 15th running this Sunday.  Appearing with support from JRN, Japan's Shingo Igarashi (Josai Univ. Coaching Staff) and Yoshiko Sakamoto (Y.W.C.) face competitive fields from Kenya and Ethiopia.  The course record setter at January's Katsuta Marathon, Igarashi scored some attention at April's Boston Marathon when he frontran the first 10 km before suffering a minor stress fracture.  Muenster will be his first marathon since then, and he is optimistic of bettering his 2:13:15 best from his Katsuta win.  That PB ranks him 3rd in the field, not far behind 2:12:08 man Joel Kositany (Kenya).  In another class is the heavy favorite, Kenya's Duncan Koech with a 2:09:17 at the 2014 Vienna Marathon.  At the pre-race press conference race director Michael Brinkmann said that he hopes to see a 2:07 winning time, a major improvement on the current 2:10:25 course record and something that only ...

Japanese distance runners didn't exactly impress in Rio, but the next month or two will see quite a few racing on the roads overseas in search of   keiken , that ever-elusive experience that is somehow going to someday transform them into Olympic marathon medalists.  A few of the road races with Japanese athletes on their entry lists: Sept. 11: Muenster Marathon, Germany men: Shingo Igarashi (Josai University Coaching Staff) women: Yoshiko Sakamoto (Y.W.C.) Sept. 11: Great North Run, U.K. men: Kazuhiro Maeda (Kyudenko) Sept. 18: Sydney Marathon, Australia men: Sota Hoshi (Fujitsu) Sept. 18: Porto Half Marathon, Portugal men: Hiroshi Ichida (Asahi Kasei), Shun Inoura (Yachiyo Kogyo), Yusei Nakao (Smiley Angel AC) women: Nao Isaka (Hitachi), Ayumi Kubo (Kagoshima Ginko) Sept. 25: Berlin Marathon, Germany men: Yuki Kawauchi (Saitama Pref. Gov't) women: Reia Iwade (Noritz) Sept. 25: Warsaw Marathon, Poland men: Akiyuki Iwanaga (Kyudenko) Oct. 9: Chic...

by Brett Larner 29-year-old Shingo Igarashi , a former Subaru corporate runner now working as an assistant coach for Josai University 's Hakone Ekiden team, ran a PB 2:13:15 to break the 16-year-old course record at the 64th edition of the Katsuta Marathon , one of Japan's biggest marathons.  Igarashi and Naoki Inoue ran alone out front of the field, accompanied a short way by veteran corporate runner Norio Kamijo , but Igarashi, running his third marathon in just over two months, proved to have the best command of the course's hilly sections as he dropped both competitors to seal the win.  Igarashi's time was a PB by 31 seconds and took over a minute and a half off the 2:14:54 course record.  Inoue just missed joining him under the record, taking 2nd in a solid 2:15:05, with Kamijo fading to 2:20:15 for 3rd. The women's race saw local Hitachi corporate runners go 1-2, Kana Kurosawa getting the win in 2:43:40 over teammate Yuka Mikami , who ran 2:46:22.  Jus...

by Brett Larner Despite heavy snow throughout much of western Japan and a nearby volcanic eruption which has continued through recent weeks, times were quick at the 49th Nobeoka Nishi Nippon Marathon with four of the top ten recording PBs and the remaining six marking their debuts. Winner Kenji Takeuchi (Team Toyota Kyushu), a former teammate of Beijing Olympics marathon gold medalist Samuel Wanjiru (Kenya) and coached by Barcelona Olympics marathon silver medalist Koichi Morishita , clocked a ten-minute PB to win in 2:12:44, putting him inside the five fastest winning times in Nobeoka. Runner-up Takumi Owada (Team Hitachi Cable) broke his own PB by nine minutes to finish 40 seconds back from Takeuchi in 2:13:24. Takuro Yamashita (Team Fujitsu), instrumental in Asia University's 2006 Hakone Ekiden win, took four minutes off his PB to round out the top three in 2:13:33. Little changed for the first part of the race as pacer Yoshikazu Kawazoe (Team Asahi Kasei) took a large pac...