408 went under 70 min at Ageo Half this year

i made a mistake china has the 2nd most number of women marathoners in the top 100

japan has 20 of the all time top top women marathoners.

china 16

kenya and russia 11 each

ethiopia 9

romania 4

others usa 2

I think Brett does bring up a salient point. These are mostly college-aged guys doing this. Our college-aged guys are busy going sub-32:00 (31:43 is roughly equivalent to 1:10) for 10k xc. How many US male runners go sub-31:43 for 10k xc between D1, D2, D3, and NAIA? And that's on uneven, soft footing, at best, if not outright slippery slop. For the latter type of conditions you could even raise that to 32:00 if not higher. Maybe not 408, but it has to be better than 200. Why don't the vast majority of those guys move to the roads after college? I'd estimate that the way that road racing has been developed and marketed (read: poorly) as a sport has quite a bit to do with it. So to a degree this reflection revisits Reavis's remarks.

Agreed; we could totally create something close to on a par with this if we got everyone from NCAA xc's to run in a half-marathon road race. Or think about college track meets: you see tons of sub-14:30's at the meets like Mt. SAC, and tons of sub-15:00's at regional meets (Princeton, Penn relays, etc.).

soulrunner wrote:

That is amazing. I ran nearly the same time and was 15th in SA. Are there any half marathons in the States that are as competitve as Ageo City? I know there are usually 20-25 finishers under 70 in the Austin, TX 3M Half Marathon, but that is nothing compared to Ageo City.

The 3M half drops over 100 meters from start to finish and doesn't have much uphill.

mcmillan's calculator had 70 equiv to 24:58 8k and 31:27 10k. there are literally 500 to 1000 collegians in this country who have beaten those times this year. yet, there are few half marathons in this country (without prize money attracting the kenyan and ethiopian runners) where 1:08-1:10 isn't good enough to win. also, the collegiate depth is obviously far greater than the marathon depth. if high 32 10k guys can run 2:25 (more commonly 30-31), then we should have a lot of recent post-collegians running in the 2:20s or better.

I agree that we could easily have 400 sub 70 guys if all of our college athletes ran a half, but could we get 168 people under 64:30? I think a lot of the guys who ran the trials could get there or close, and then add in some college athletes and we are getting a little closer. But I don't think we could match Japan's depth in the half or the marathon.

1:04:30 is equiv to 8:00 3k, 13:57 5k, 23:00 8k, 28:59 10k.

we don't have too many people who could do those times. maybe 30-50 every year in college. but if you took those collegians and added a few more in the 23-27 group (say, 40-70), 28-32 (30-50), and 32-36 (20-30), you'd have some good depth, but then that would mean that the upper level collegians were running seriously for a long time after college, instead of, say, going to medical school.

is there something special about japanese training that produces so many good half marathoners and marathoners but doesn't get them to the sub-1 hr point? i.e. lots and lots of miles but limited speedwork?

Hmmn, TecNet just updated the results list to include net time. Now it's 408 under 70 on gross time, 412 on net.

guys,

you have to also look beyond the collegiate level...

the depth of Japanese running scene is devastating at all levels.

They have marathons with entry requirements at sub 2h30 or 2h45' which can still gather hundreds of amateur runners.

Even their Master runners can run sub2h45' in droves...

The main reason and driver is that long distance running is a main sport in Japan, so everybody is motivated to give his best, at all levels.

All the marathon are televised live (better, the TV channels themselves are the organizers because they can get huge audience and get advert income). Hakone Ekiden is live for 2 days !!

Fukuoka marathon has spectators at every inch of the course, much more than Boston and NYC put together, even if it is a "smaller" city in comparison.

So, running is a major sport in Japan, at the pair of NFL in USA or soccer in Europe.

Collegiate runners can continue their career in Professional corporate teams because it is a sure way to make income, without begging for shoe contracts.

So maybe the starting point is the same (same number of young studs), but in Japan the environment to keep on running hard is at different level

that's awesome. no wonder there's not a lot of obese japanese and they live so long.

There was a 1/2 in Japan in 2007 which had 700 under 69 minutes.

I'll look for the results.

Halfr

runduderun faster faster wrote:

Agreed; we could totally create something close to on a par with this if we got everyone from NCAA xc's to run in a half-marathon road race. Or think about college track meets: you see tons of sub-14:30's at the meets like Mt. SAC, and tons of sub-15:00's at regional meets (Princeton, Penn relays, etc.).

I think this is exactly right. As it stands, the equivalent colleagiate guys wait until the end of the XC season, then MAYBE step into a pre-Christmas half marathon (such as St. Jude in Memphis) without focused HM training.

Brett in Tokyo wrote:

Here's a good picture of the start:

http://www.tecnoplan.co.jp/tecnet/img.php?id=229&type=3&num=8

You can tell where the university guys end and the regular people start pretty easily.

nice synchronized hair cuts

isn't it odd that asian-americans in the US rarely run well?

The more shocking figure is the 100th runner in 1:05:28

Also, remember that Japan has a population of @125 mil and the US @300 mil. A per capita comparison would require the US to have a race with about 1000 sub 70 min runners. I am not so sure you could find 1000 sub 70 min runners in the US, even if you had every D I, II, III, juco and over-achiever high school runner train for a half instead of track/XC.

It is also interesting that so few break through and are competitive on an international level. The per capita numer of sub 70 runners is approaching East African depth, yet, the Japanese are no where near the East Africans on the elite level. Is it a cultural thing that Japanese see running as recreational and not a profession, diverting a lot of talent out of college into the regular workforce?

John Smallberries wrote:

It is also interesting that so few break through and are competitive on an international level. The per capita numer of sub 70 runners is approaching East African depth, yet, the Japanese are no where near the East Africans on the elite level. Is it a cultural thing that Japanese see running as recreational and not a profession, diverting a lot of talent out of college into the regular workforce?

No, I think it's the opposite. They see it as very, very professional, and spend their careers running for corporate ekiden teams and at the Fukuoka, Beppu-Oita, Biwako and Tokyo marathons without every going overseas. Japanese runners might not be able to win majors anymore with the current jitsugyodan system but if they were going out and running the 2nd and 3rd tier marathons worldwide the way Kenyans and Ethiopians do then I think they would most definitely be competitive on an international level. According to the current system, however, there is no motivation whatsoever to do this.

Treadmillionaire wrote:

The 3M half drops over 100 meters from start to finish and doesn't have much uphill.

That's what makes Ageo City impressive. Only 20-25 under 70 on a down hill course with prize money 10 deep.

Brett- Have you ever wanted to be a travel agent? I think you could make a tour to this race for runners who aren't afraid to get pulled along to a fast time. Seriously.

To think my lifetime best would place me barely in the top 500 (1:12:58 18 years ago) is awe-inspiring and humbling. I can't look up the results for language based reasons - so I will ask you. I ran 1:22:18 as a 44 year old this year. Where would that have placed me o/a and in age?