Know Your Japanese Runners in Boston

The withdrawal of Kentaro Nakamoto (Yasukawa Denki), Japan's best championship marathoner of the modern era, from the Boston Marathon field with a stress fracture is a blow to what would have been the best Japanese contingent in Boston in decades.

Yuki Kawauchi (Saitama Pref. Gov't) leads the way, arriving in Boston off wins in his last four marathons:

2:10:03, Hofu Yomiuri Marathon, 12/17/17
2:18:59 CR, Marshfield New Year's Day Marathon, 1/1/18
2:11:46 CR, Kitakyushu Marathon, 2/18/18
2:14:12, Wan Jin Shi Marathon, 3/18/18

Kawauchi hopes to at least equal Suguru Osako's top 3 placing in last year's Boston, his optimism growing as the weather forecast gets worse.

Naoki Okamoto (Chugoku Denryoku) runs for what was once Japan's most successful corporate team in the marathon, his best of 2:12:31 coming 6 years ago at Lake Biwa and his fastest recent time a 2:13:33 in Tokyo last year. Okamoto earned a place in Boston by winning February's tough and hilly Ome 30 km in 1:33:09.

A high-volume marathoner like Kawauchi, Kansuke Morihashi (Raffine) won January's Katsuta Marathon in 2:16:51 to earn an invite to Boston. A month later he followed up with a PB of 2:14:25 at the Tokyo Marathon, jogging the Seoul Marathon three weeks after that in a fun run effort.

Topping the women's side is another idiosyncratic high-volume marathoner, Hiroko Yoshitomi (Memolead). Yoshitomi won the hilly Katsuta Marathon in January in 2:33:56, the second-fastest winning time in event history, then came back a week later to smash the Beppu-Oita Mainichi Marathon course record with a 2:33:00 win. A week after that she took 9th in the National Corporate Half Marathon Championships in 1:13:58. Two weeks later in Tokyo she ran 2:30:16 for 6th, cutting over a minute off her five-year-old PB. Three weeks after that, a 2:33:57 win in her hometown Saga Sakura Marathon.

Ome women's winner Maki Ashi (Kyudenko) rounds out the Japanese lineup in her marathon debut at age 24. A 1:11:12 half marathoner, Ashi ran 1:44:14 in Ome to seal up a trip to Boston. Interestingly, joining her in Boston as her coach is the just-retired Kazuhiro Maeda, a longtime rival of Kawauchi's who was part of the 2013 Moscow World Championships team alongside both Kawauchi and Nakamoto.

All-time Boston Marathon Japanese Men's Top Ten

2:09:27 - Toshihiko Seko, 1st, 1981
2:10:13 - Toshihiko Seko, 2nd, 1979
2:10:28 - Suguru Osako, 3rd, 2017
2:11:02 - Hiromi Taniguchi, 4th, 1993
2:11:32 - Kenjiro Jitsui, 6th, 2006
2:11:50 - Toshihiko Seko, 1st, 1987
2:13:15 - Takayuki Inubushi, 10th, 1998
2:13:40 - Tomoyuki Taniguchi, 5th, 1987
2:13:49 - Yoshiaki Unetani, 1st, 1969
2:13:55 - Akinori Kuramata, 11th, 1998

All-time Boston Marathon Japanese Women's Top Ten

2:24:11 - Reiko Tosa, 3rd, 2006
2:26:26 - Yoshiko Yamamoto, 2nd, 1992
2:26:39 - Yuko Arimori, 3rd, 1999
2:26:52 - Kiyoko Shimahara, 5th, 2006
2:29:24 - Nobuko Fujimura, 3rd, 1996
2:30:34 - Mitsuko Hirose, 8th, 1999
2:30:40 - Yurika Nakamura, 6th, 2010
2:31:12 - Junko Asari, 6th, 1997
2:31:31 - Kaori Tanabe, 10th, 2001
2:31:39 - Yoshiko Yamamoto, 6th, 1995

10000 m National Championships Preview

Less than five months since the 2023 10000 m National Championships went down at the 2021 Olympic stadium in Tokyo, the 2024 edition happens Friday at Shizuoka's Ecopa Stadium, with NHK broadcasting it live starting at 19:25 local time. Doubling up on Nationals like this lets Japanese athletes double dip on placing points to try to get into the Paris Olympics on rankings. But between the number of people who've hit the 30:40.00 women's standard and 27:00.00 men's standard and the lopsided eight spots given away to top placers at World XC, there are only four women's spots and three men's available via rankings. Of those, three of the four women's spots and two of the three men's spots are currently occupied by top placers at December's 2023 Nationals, Ririka Hironaka , Haruka Kokai and Rino Goshima for women and Ren Tazawa and Tomoki Ota for men. The 2023 Nationals did get close to the standards, with Hironaka leading the top four women under

Goshima and Kasai Win 10000 m National Titles, Maeda Breaks U20 Asian Record

Rino Goshima and Jun Kasai stepped up with PBs to win the 2024 National Championships 10000 m titles Friday at Shizuoka's Ecopa Stadium. In the women's race, Goshima, 4th in last December's 2023 National Championships 10000 m, went out front from the start with Kenyan teammate Judy Jepngetich pacing and 2023 3rd-placer Haruka Kokai in tow. Things were never on track to hit the 30:40.00 Paris Olympics standard, but except for a brief dip to 3:08 at 7000 m Goshima held steady at 3:05 to 3:06/km even as Kokai and Jepngetich fell off. With blood dripping from her left knee after getting spiked by Jepngetich, Goshima closed in 3:03 to take 5 seconds off her best from December's Nationals and win in 30:53.31, moving up to all-time Japanese #6. Jepngetich also PBd at 31:09.42 without counting in the standings, with Kokai 2nd in 31:10.53 and Kazuna Kanetomo 3rd in a PB 31:59.29. The runner-up last time, Yuka Takashima was last in 33:33.27. The men's race went out in a

Golden Games in Nobeoka Top Results

For everyone not running yesterday's 10000 m National Championships , where the Asahi Kasei corporate team dominated the men's race with four out of four men sub-28 including winner Jun Kasai , 27:17.46, the grand dame of Japan's long distance time trial circuit was happening on AK's home ground in Miyazaki at the Golden Games in Nobeoka . Not including kids' races, a total of 74 women and 227 men ran in 14 heats of 5000 m, with a packed-in crowd of fans lining the track beating on metal sponsor boards with batons. It's a pretty awesome meet, and memorable performances included: National champion Kamimura Gakuen H.S. standout Caroline Kariba continued to kill it in the second month of her corporate league career, winning the 5000 m A-heat in 15:00.95 in a race where 3 out of the top 4 including her ran PBs. National champion Meijo University seemed flat at this point in the season, with none of its people under 16 minutes and star Nanase Tanimoto leading

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