2023 OUTdoors

[Paul7711]

Great news and will certainly be contacting European Athletics to thank them for the increased coverage .
Fully appreciate what they are doing - but the icing on the cake would be a weekly highlight programme .
Football has Match of the Day - athletics would benefit from a similar show .

[LuckySpikes]

Oh, well played European Athletics!

They've just announced further Conti Tour Silver & Bronze meetings that they're going to live stream (with English comms) and crucially they include:

• All the French meetings which you may recall are now behind the French Federation's paywall - without EA's intervention it would have cost £9 (for 2 months subs) if you wanted to watch all those meetings this summer. You might remember that during the indoor season they also showed several of the French meetings. Again, these were only otherwise accessible behind the paywall.
• Two meetings in Finland and Sweden for which the TV broadcasts are geo-blocked. Hopefully, they're working on getting the 8 or 9 other Finnish & Swedish meetings too, all currently geo-blocked.

They say there's more live streams to be added - currently it only goes up to 17th July.

The current list can be found at https://www.european-athletics.com/n...vents-in-2023-

It's also great that in recent years they've been routinely live streaming the European 10,000m Cup, the European Race Walking Team Championships & the European Champion Clubs Cup XC. These were all events that were previously more difficult to watch (or impossible sometimes).

So, I'm going to email European Athletics to tell them they're doing a fantastic job getting these live streams. Maybe other people might want to as well? Perhaps the more people that show appreciation, the more motivated they will be to continue doing this for many years to come?

[LuckySpikes]

On days 1 & 2 of the four-day Kansai Region University Championships in Nagai, Japan ...

Much of the action hasn't been of the highest order (though still not bad) but there has been entertaining racing and a cracking atmosphere generated from the stands by the teams chanting, cheering and sometimes dancing.

The most significant race so far in terms of the national collegiate picture was the Women's 10,000.

After I'd hyped the Women's 10,000 in Nobeoka 3 weeks ago and it turned out to be a bit of a damp squib, I was somewhat nervous having done the same for the 10,000 here. However, the girls did me (and themselves) proud this time. It was a good race with 3 women who'll be representing Japan at the World University Games (Universiade) in late July - Hikaru Kitagawa, Rio Einaga & Tomo Muramatsu.
The slightly surprise package was Miku Isono who got into the breakaway group of 4. In fact, after Einaga had led most of the race, it was Isono who upped the pace with about 3km to go, covering the next 1000m three seconds quicker than the prior kilometres. But, it wasn't enough to shake off the classy trio behind her. Hikaru Kitagawa always looks like she's having to work harder than the other athletes (maybe it's her more "active" arms that give that impression), however ...

She clearly had plenty left in the tank and had a very impressive kick, blitzing the last 400 in 66 seconds to win in a click over 33 minutes. Muramatsu was second 3s back & Einaga 3rd. Isono was rewarded with a 19s PB in 4th.

All of the above except Einaga are due to race the 5000 on Sunday. As third year students Muramatsu & Einaga will have another year in the University ranks.

You can watch the finish here, joining the race with just over 600m to go Isono is still leading and Hikaru Kitagawa in the all-red kit - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U-u4k2WzCik&t=24660s

In the Men's 4x100 final Kansai University stormed away to a 38.91 CR and in the Women's, Konan University also broke the CR with 44.83. They had one of the very few 1st year student winners in their team - Miu Kurashige won the W 100 final in 11.63 (+0.0).

[Grassmarket]

Marcel Jacobs a scratch already! “Lombo-sacral nerve” it says here. Bad back ain’t it?

[RunUnlimited]

She is starting to get into that range now, yeah. Jumping 6.70m+ is likely to win you a lot more competitions than losing them. Also, consistency in this range will garner Hadaway more invites to continental meetings, and eventually Diamond League meetings too.

It's still a tall order to get the (ridiculously steep in my view) World Championship qualifying standard of 6.85m, but with the way she's been jumping so far, I wouldn't put it passed Hadaway in achieving it.

[Occasional Hope]

Ian Hodge reported a super 6.73 pb for Lucy Hadaway. She’s really getting up into world class territory now.

[MR_ME]

I thought the same when I saw the 1500 entry list. I would expect some late additions to the field. Also good to see MHS in the 400 alongside AHW.

[Loop-guru]

Just trawled through the BMC entry lists for Saturday and there were a few that caught the eye. In the 800M Alex Botterill runs his first 800M of the season after opening impressively with a 3:42 1500M. In the 800M A race it's the new kid on the block Phoebe Gill up against Lynsey Sharp. And a similar matchup in the 1500M with Abigail Ives against Sarah Macdonald. In the 5000M Will Barnicoat and Emile Cairess are down to run and Piers Copeland looks the standout in the Emsley Carr Mile.

[LuckySpikes]

The Rabat DL entry lists are up - https://rabat.diamondleague.com/en/p...results-rabat/

No prizes for guessing what event ends the meeting!

Kerley, Jacobs, Omanyala & Bromell in the 100.
Jakob, Kipsang & Nuguse in the 1500.

The Women's 1500 must be the smallest field I'v ever seen for a DL 1500 (with Mouchet and (?) Naumov likely to be pacers). Still, it's got Tsegay, Freweyni Hailu & Linden Hall so mustn't grumble.

[Ursus]

Just picked up that Alekna has thrown 70.40 to back up his 71.00.

His Dad ‘only’ exceeded 70m in 20 comps.

[MysteryBrick]

Furlani showed he was a serious talent in winning the European U18 LJ and HJ last year, but 8.44m is the longest Junior Jump in history (albeit windy)!!!! And he's a junior next year...

[LuckySpikes]

Other (non-British) results from the International Meeting Città Di Savona in Italy, including 2 National Records and a very long LJ (unfortunately just too windy) ...

Women
100 (+1.0): ... 2 Patrizia van der Weken (LUX) 11.18 NR - improves her own NR by 0.11 (ran 11.07 in the heats but with a 3.8 wind)
100H (+2.0): 1 Hurske 12.80, 2 Graversgaard (DEN) 12.83 NR - improving her own NR by 0.01
TJ: 1 Lafond (DOM) 14.68 (+2.9) - longest wind-legal jump 14.25

Men
200 (+1.6): 1 Reynier Mena (CUB) 19.95
400H: 1 Samba 48.56, 2 Sibilio 48.72
LJ: 1 Mattia Furlani 8.44 (+2.2) - only 1 other valid jump, 8.00 (+1.7)
SP: 1 Z Weir 21.60

[LuckySpikes]

At the weekend's East Japan Corporate Championships in Tochigi ...

As is quite common these days at regional Corporate Championships, there were a lot of big name withdrawals. It probably didn't help either that the Golden Grand Prix was also that weekend. However, there were a few performances worthy of comment.

Alongside Benson Kiplangat winning narrowly over Richard Yator in the 10,000 in 27:50.39, Soshi Mizukubo's 20.43 PB (+0.2) to win the 200 was probably the performance of the meeting. That's the third time he's run 20.4x this year but the first time wind-legal, and thus he improved his PB by 0.18.

An update on Haruka Kokai ... After a couple of very good Ekiden legs this winter, I highlighted this talented 20yo as one-to-watch and she delivered with a 32:01 PB at 10,000 in Nobeoka 3 weeks ago. Here she was in the 3000 (really on the short side for her) and after running a second lap of 70s to bridge the 2-3s gap to the two Kenyan leaders she ran 9:04.56 with a 2:56 last 1000, an 8s PB and three seconds behind the winner Janeth Nyiva (KEN). So, for Kokai that's 3 PBs in 3 track races this year.

Harumi Okamoto's season debut was tough - 9:26.9 for this 15:20 / 31:28 athlete after she had looked so good back in February, finishing 2nd at Cross Vallagarina in Italy.

In the Women's Pole Vault, Misaki Morota added 12cm to her PB, winning with 4.32.

At the Kysuhu Region Corporate Championships in Fukuoka, Benard Kibet Koech (KEN) ran a 27:07.71 SB - # 4 in the world this year. He's a fun athlete to watch, a bit ungainly and given to big surges and to sometimes over-stretching himself with the early pace.

[Ladyloz]

Lyles almost caught him yesterday. The US Champs will be very interesting

[MysteryBrick]

Not loving seeing Coleman back winning...