Skip to main content

Nojiri and Tsuji Win Hokkaido Marathon

by Brett Larner

Taking on increased importance as the Japanese Federation focuses on hot weather racing in the lead-up to the 2020 Tokyo Olympics men's and women's marathons, the Hokkaido Marathon featured one of its deepest men's fields in memory.  The women's field was smaller but featured at least three good up-and-coming talents.  Getting the better of them all in the mid-20s temperatures was former pro-XC skier and mountain running champion Azusa Nojiri (Hiratsuka Lease), a 2:24:57 marathoner while at the Sachiko Yamashita-coached Daiichi Seimei corporate team but mostly unsuccessful since leaving to follow an Arata Fujiwara-inspired route of independent sponsorship.  In Hokkaido Nojiri easily dropped the rest of the field to win in 2:30:26, a quality mark in a typically hot race that rarely sees sub-2:30 winning times.  Debuting runner-up Shoko Mori (Team Otsuka Seiyaku) was nearly five minutes back in 2:35:10, just beating pre-race favorite Yuka Yano (Canon AC Kyushu) who took 3rd in 2:35:22.  Seemingly immortal masters' runner Chihiro Tanaka (Athlec AC), 44, the 1997 and 2003 Hokkaido winner, was 6th in 2:41:48.

Despite its depth the men's race played out slower than expected.  Last year's runner-up Shigeki Tsuji (Team Otsuka Seiyaku), coached by Japan's first 2:06 man Takayuki Inubushi, used his experience to his advantage to outdo over a half dozen runners with faster times, taking the win by more than a minute over the promising Ryoichi Matsuo (Team Asahi Kasei) in 2:15:24.  3rd through 8th came in in a tight pack that saw Masamichi Shinozaki (Team Hitachi Butsuryu) outkick National Team member Masanori Sakai (Team Kyudenko) for 3rd in  2:17:22.  Etsu Miyata (Arata Project), another runner to leave the corporate team system in search of independence and finding it with support from Olympian Fujiwara, was 8th in 2:17:46 in a step back from injury problems shortly after going his own way.  Look for Miyata, Fujiwara and other corporate league expatriates in Fujiwara's Arata Project club team to run November's East Japan Corporate Ekiden in a shot at making the New Year Ekiden national corporate championships.

Hokkaido Marathon
Sapporo, Hokkaido, 8/31/14
official results coming shortly

Women
1. Azusa Nojiri (Hiratsuka Lease) - 2:30:26
2. Shoko Mori (Team Otsuka Seiyaku) - 2:35:10 - debut
3. Yuka Yano (Canon AC Kyushu) - 2:35:22
4. Megumi Amako (Canon AC Kyushu) - 2:37:42 - debut
5. Manami Kamitanida (Team Hitachi) - 2:41:00
6. Chihiro Tanaka (Athlec AC) - 2:41:48

Men
1. Shigeki Tsuji (Team Otsuka Seiyaku) - 2:15:24
2. Ryoichi Matsuo (Team Asahi Kasei) - 2:16:32
3. Masamichi Shinozaki (Team Hitachi Butsuryu) - 2:17:22
4. Masanori Sakai (Team Kyudenko) - 2:17:24
5. Yuji Iwata (Team Mitsubishi Juko Nagasaki) - 2:17:26
6. Yuki Oshikawa (Team Toyota Kyushu) - 2:17:32
7. Takuya Suzuki (Team Aisan Kogyo) - 2:17:35
8. Etsu Miyata (Arata Project) - 2:17:46
9. Yukihiro Kitaoka (Team NTN) - 2:19:06
10. Shingo Igarahi (Team Subaru) - 2:19:10
11. Kiyokatsu Hasegawa (Team JR Higashi Nihon) - 2:19:19
12. Masaki Hori (Team Otsuka Seiyaku) - 2:19:53

(c) 2014 Brett Larner
all rights reserved

Comments

Most-Read This Week

Japan's Olympic Marathon Team Meets the Press

With renewed confidence, Japan's Olympic marathon team will face the total 438 m elevation difference hills of Paris this summer. The members of the women's and men's marathon teams for August's Paris Olympics appeared at a press conference in Tokyo on Mar. 25 in conjunction with the Japan Marathon Championship Series III (JMC) awards gala. Women's Olympic trials winner Yuka Suzuki (Daiichi Seimei) said she was riding a wave of motivation in the wake of the new women's national record. When she watched Honami Maeda (Tenmaya) set the record at January's Osaka International Women's Marathon on TV, Suzuki said she was, "absolutely stunned." Her coach Sachiko Yamashita told her afterward, "When someone breaks the NR, things change," and Suzuki found herself saying, "I want to take my shot." After training for a great run in Paris, she said, "I definitely want to break the NR in one of my marathons after that." Mao

Weekend Racing Roundup

  China saw a new men's national record of 2:06:57 from  Jie He  at the Wuxi Marathon Sunday, but in Japan it was a relatively quiet weekend with mostly cold and rainy amateur-level marathons across the country. At the Tokushima Marathon , club runner Yuhi Yamashita  won the men's race by almost 4 1/2 minutes in 2:17:02, the fastest Japanese men's time of the weekend, but oddly took 22 seconds to get across the starting line. The women's race saw a close finish between the top two, with Shiho Iwane  winning in 2:49:33 over Ayaka Furukawa , 2nd in 2:49:46.  At the 41st edition of the Sakura Marathon in Chiba, Yukie Matsumura  (Comodi Iida) ran the fastest Japanese women's time of the weekend, 2:42:45, to take the win. Club runner Yuki Kuroda  won the men's race in 2:20:08.  Chika Yokota  won the Saga Sakura Marathon women's race in 2:49:33.  Yuki Yamada  won the men's race in 2:21:47 after taking the lead in the final 2 km.  Naoki Inoue  won the 16th r

Sprinter Shoji Tomihisa Retires From Athletics at 105

A retirement ceremony for local masters track and field legend Shoji Tomihisa , 105, was held May 13 at his usual training ground at Miyoshi Sports Park Field in Miyoshi, Hiroshima. Tomihisa began competing in athletics at age 97, setting a Japanese national record 16.98 for 60 m in the men's 100~104 age group at the 2017 Chugoku Masters Track and Field meet. Last year Tomihisa was the oldest person in Hiroshima selected to run as a torchbearer in the Tokyo Olympics torch relay. Due to the coronavirus pandemic the relay on public roads was canceled, and while he did take part in related ceremonies his run was ultimately canceled. Tomihisa recently took up the shot put, but in light of his fading physical strength he made the decision to retire from competition. Around 30 members of the Shoji Tomihisa Booster Club attended the retirement ceremony. After receiving a bouquet of flowers from them Tomihisa in turn gave them a colored paper placard on which he had written the characters