2023 OUTdoors

[marra]

Just watched a replay of the race. She looked super relaxed, in the best possible way. Very composed run. All business, so to speak.

Obviously Eugene in July is not Budapest in Aug but have to agree that if she can replicate that, she's absolutely a threat to the Jamaicans.

Like you say, she has seemed in a better place this year. From a purely athletic point of view, am glad. Whatever one thinks of her personality/history, her raw talent has never been in doubt and deserves to be seen on the big stages.

[Occasional Hope]

Quite a long way, LOL.

And today no mark in the LJ and she DNF the 800.

[Occasional Hope]

10.71 for Shacarri Richardson in the first round of the US trials. She really looks like she's got herself together this year and will be one of the contenders for gold in Budapest.

[LuckySpikes]

At yesterday's Round 2 of the Hokuren Distance Challenge in Fukagawa, Japan ...

The day started with at least a dozen PBs in the five 800m races and all the winners ran a lifetime best, despite it being 30 degrees C. By the end of the meeting the temperature had dropped to 21 C but it was still a bit too toasty for distance running.

20yo Ai Watanabe won the Women's 'A' race in 2:03.75 PB - she's improved by almost 3 seconds this season. Asian Championships rep Ayano Shiomi was 3rd, 2:04.73, after maybe going out too ambitiously in 59.4 at the bell.
So, that's 2 women who have gone sub-2:04 for the first time this season (Airi Ikezaki as well). This is progress for Japanese women's 800m running!

The Men's 10,000m 'A' race came down to a three-way last lap battle, James Muoki (KEN) prevailing in 27:43.67 over Jonathan Ndiku and Andrew Lorot. A number of Japanese men had gone out at 28 minute tempo for the first few kilometres but the conditions told in the end and the top Japanese over the 3 races was Hideaki Sumiyoshi in 28:26.18, a SB and around 5 seconds off his PB.

The Women's 10,000 was led out by Agnes Mwikali (KEN) on her debut, eventually winning in 32:15.47. For much of the race there were Japanese women only a few seconds behind her and until around 4000m there were 7 or 8 of them right on the 32:30 tempo set by the wavelights. By halfway though that had whittled down to 4 athletes, hitting that mark in 16:12 a few seconds ahead of the lights. Hikaru Kitagawa, one of the top collegians, was one of them and it was she who broke all the others, getting to around 7500m with the wavelights. At that point she started slowing but she dug in gamely and was rewarded with a 13s PB, 32:39.02. In the warm conditions only 3 of the dozen 32 minute women broke 33 minutes, Akane Yabushita the other in 32:56.

In the Men's 5000 'A' race 18yo Dennis Kipkurui (KEN) won in 13:31.27, breaking his PB by 31 seconds. Nice!

Martha Mokaya (KEN) looked like she was on her way to victory in the Women's 5000 'A' race. She led Momoka Kawaguchi by 5s at the bell but really suffered on the last lap, allowing Kawaguchi to overhaul her and win in 15:42.93. Kawaguchi looked very comfortable down the home straight and is Bangkok-bound next week for the Asian Championships 10,000. Sayaka Sato looked like she might not have recovered fully from her 10,000 victory four days ago and was third, 17 seconds back.

Unfortunately, Nanami Watanabe was a DNS in the Women's 3000. I hope she's OK for the 5000 in Bangkok. I don't know what's been ailing Ai Hosoda in the past couple of months but it was a so-so return to racing for her, 3rd in 9:17.89. Korea's Daeun Jeong looked much better than she did in the second half of the 5000 in Round 1 and she won in a 9:08.98 PB.

Round 3 is in Abashiri this Saturday when the depth and quality goes up a notch or two.

[jjimbojames]

Wilson is only doing the flat at the US Trials, so won’t be in the hurdles in Budapest. Based on her 200m, I doubt SMU appears in Budapest - but depending on how Day 2 goes, I think she’s seeing how far off hep gold she is for Paris…

[weekend warrior]

Interesting. Will she use her bye to the World Champs 400m do you know? It's one of the most exciting and difficult to call events if she is not there. Paulino the only woman under 49 seconds this season but on form Britton Wilson is a big threat (and maybe shouldn't double) along with Adeleke.

[jjimbojames]

Whether she turns up or not, who knows!

In other news, less than 3 months after giving birth, SMU is currently taking part in the heptathlon at the Bahamian Champs! Completed day one with 14.60w / 1.58 / 11.83 / 25.31

[Occasional Hope]

Yes, I assumed it must be an injury.

[Chafford1]

I see Shelly Ann Fraser Pryce has only enetered the 200 at the Jamaican trials. I think that will be her first race of the year?

Knee injury in Kenya in May prevented her competing.

[Grassmarket]

New WR record set in the Beer Mile, which is a kind of biathlon where you must drink a beer every lap instead of shooting targets.

https://youtu.be/srsT5HWTfxQ

[LuckySpikes]

A 4:07.05 SB and victory for Nozomi Tanaka in Joensuu (FIN). That's much better! 62-mid for the last lap.
When she races internationally you realize how tiny she is. Some of the other women towered over her!

In 2nd Laura Pellicoro (ITA) ran a 3s PB, 4:08.52.
Georgia Griffith was awful - going backwards after 600m and running 4:24.79.

[Occasional Hope]

I see Shelly Ann Fraser Pryce has only enetered the 200 at the Jamaican trials. I think that will be her first race of the year?

[LuckySpikes]

At Round 1 of the Hokuren Distance Challenge (Shibetsu, JPN) on Saturday ...

There weren't a ton of fast times but these meetings get deeper, especially from Round 3 onwards.

My theory that Daeun Jeong would be the most likely of the Koreans to feature high up here was blown out of the water in the very first race when Korean high-schooler, Woo-rim Park (7th in the field on PBs), won the Women's 800 'B' race, improving her PB by 2.1s.

In the Women's 3000 'A' race won by Eva Cherono in 8:55.80, Ririka Hironaka was the real story. After a 3:00 first 1000 where she had broken away with the 2 Kenyans things looked promising but soon after she started to struggle, eventually finishing 9th in 9:20.63. So really, no better than the 15:55 she ran four weeks ago in the Japanese Championships 5000. She is qualified for the Worlds 10,000 but it's now hard to imagine that she'll be ready to do herself justice there. She's on the team for the Asian Games 5 and 10 in early October so that looks like a more realistic target to get in shape for. But, she is down to run the 5000 at Round 3 next Saturday and again 4 days later at Round 4 so we'll see how she comes on (or not).

Nozomi Tanaka won the 1500 'A' race in 4:12.75. She didn't seem to have much left on the last lap but then she didn't have much competition. Japan's # 3 Yume Goto hasn't yet reached her best this year and # 2 Ran Urabe is currently out injured I think. Hopefully, Tanaka can be pushed/pulled to run 5 or 6 seconds quicker in Finland this Wednesday when she's racing Georgia Griffith and Marissa Damink.

The Men's 5000 'C' race was in effect the 'A' race with 19 Kenyans and 1 lone Japanese, Tomoki Ota. They did start with intent to follow the lights at 13:10 pace but after 1000m it slowed and got cagey. So much so that Ota was able to take the lead with 2 laps to go. The eventual surprise winner was 18yo Samuel Kibathi in a 3s PB with 13:23.76. Tomoki Ota also broke his PB (by 11s) with 13:24.59. He's run 27:33 and 60:08 for the Half so his new PB is now a bit more in line with them. 21yo Haruto Ishizuka won the 'A' race, looking strong after breaking away with several laps to go. He ran 13:33.86, a 10s PB.

In the Women's 5000 Ayuko Suzuki was unfortunately a late DNS so that left the way open for Daeun Jeong (KOR) to win. She had been on low-15:30's pace for the first half of the race but then suffered quite a collapse in her pace to win in just north of 16-flat.

The Women's 10,000 was a bit frustrating for the wavelight pacing set at an unambitious 33:00. And so it proved with 2 women showing that with a more ambitious pace they could have run significantly quicker than the times they achieved on the night. Until 8,000m they followed the lights and the pacemaker religiously and then Sora Shinozakura went past the pacemaker and picked up the speed, followed by Sayaka Sato. Sato went on to run the last 2000 in 6:15 (3:11 and 3:04) - i.e., 31:15 pace - to win in 32:38.7 so at least it shows she's in fine shape approaching the World Champs marathon and then the MGC in October. 21yo Shinozakura ran 32:48.2 on her debut at this distance.

Round 2 takes place in Fukagawa this Wednesday.

[LuckySpikes]

At yesterday's Gold Coast Half Marathon in Oz ...

Keira D'Amato broke Emily Sisson's Area Record by 13s, running 66:39. As I thought Leanne Pompeani was the best of the Aussies, 2nd in 69:07 PB. Pashley, Batt-Doyle & French (NZL) all made it sub-70 too. In 6th place Chiharu Ikeda (JPN) took 25s off her PB with 70:12 and Kaede Kawamura was just 5s outside hers with 70:22.

Brett Robinson won the Men's in 62:16 from Keijiro Mogi (JPN), 62:20, and New Zealand's Cameron Avery ran very well to smash his PB in 3rd with 62:50.

In the Gold Coast Marathon, a WA Label road race ...

The Men's race was pretty exciting. Fast and furious from the start, 6 or 7 men passed through halfway in 63:44. Liam Adams - unsponsored and still working as a sparky - was one of them, running aggressively pushing the pace, and this raised the prospect that he could take over 3 minutes off his PB and break Brett Robinson's 2:07:31 Oceania Record! At 35km they were whittled down to 3 and Adams was still just on pace for the record. At this point Naoki Koyama (JPN) had started to pull away though. In the end Adams ran 2:08:39 in 3rd place. Koyama won in 2:07:40 PB, breaking Yuta Shitara's course record by 10s. Crucially it was also an Olympic standard for Koyama. He had missed that by 2s in Tokyo in March. Koyama has now run 4 marathons, three of them sub-2:09 and he's one of the 67 men qualified for the Marathon Grand Championship (MGC) in October, Japan's Olympic Marathon Trials. Of course, making that team will be very far from easy given the insane depth of Japanese marathon running. Koyama's time here ranks him just 11th on the 2023 Japanese toplist !
As if to emphasise my point in Part 1 of my most recent Live Streaming Links post, Koyama has raced at the Hokuren Distance Challenge several times - his best result a 5th place when he set his 27:55 PB for 10,000.

The Women's race was won by Rodah Jepkorir Tanui in 2:27:10 with Gen Gregson first Aussie in 3rd, running 2:28:33 on her marathon debut. Haruka Yamaguchi (JPN) was true to her word, using it as a training run, just inside 2:40. She's qualified for the MGC in October as well.

At the All Star Night Games (Hiratsuka, JPN), the annual Corporate vs Student match and a Japan GP series event too ...

Akira Harada won the Men's 100 in 10.10 (+0.3), a 0.01s PB.

In the Women's 100 Hurdles, NR-holder Mako Fukube just pipped the current national champ Asuka Terada, 12.90 to 12.92 (-0.9).

The Women's 800 wasn't fast but Ayano Shiomi gained "revenge" on Airi Ikezaki after Ikezaki's win at the national championships, Shiomi winning a tight home-straight battle, 2:05.47 to 2:05.54. Of interest just behind them was high-schooler Yuri Nishida, just turned 18. She's one-to-watch, I think, in the (albeit modest) context of Japanese women's 800m running. In the last 150m she made up over 10m to go from 8th to 3rd. Using the on-screen clock I calculated she made up 1.1s on Shiomi in the last 150 - with closing speed like that she's promising.

I'm still catching up on Round 1 of the Hokuren Distance Challenge so more on that later.

[LuckySpikes]

India have announced their team of 54 athletes for the Asian Championships in Bangkok, from 12th to 16th July - https://indianathletics.in/wp-conten...Final-Team.pdf

I only know the Japanese & Indian teams so far so I'll make a few comparisons between their teams. I haven't done a big search for the other teams yet but many, China included, will be much more difficult to find - their federations just aren't as good as Japan or India at putting out info on the web. I suspect though that China may be prioritising the Asian Games on home ground over these Asian Championships.

India's team is a smaller team than Japan's 78 athletes but, like Japan, it looks like a strong-ish team whilst missing 3 of their very best, in India's case Chopra, Avinash Sable & 4:05 1500 woman Harmilan Bains.

India have some very good male horizontal jumpers at the moment and 8.42 LJ'er Sreeshankar will be there in Bangkok. He was disappointing in Lausanne tonight but could/should provide good competition for Japan's Shiroyama & Hashioka and whoever the Chinese send.

In the Women's 5000 Parul Chaudhary and Ankita match up well with Yuma Yamamoto & Nanami Watanabe.

Jyothi Yarraji with her 12.82 NR in the Women's 100 Hurdles should be stiff competition for Japan's Asuka Terada & Masumi Aoki and may be a slight favourite ahead of them.

One of the best names in athletics, Jinson Johnson, is in the Men's 1500.

In the Men's Shot Put, Tajinderpal Singh Toor improved his Asian Record to 21.77 a couple of weeks ago. The Japanese have no-one who'll get close to him in Bangkok. Probably no other nation will either.

India are sending 4 very good race walkers and their 2 women should get the better of the two promising 20yo's that Japan are sending although Yukiko Umeno has made really good strides this last year.