Skip to main content

Mizuki Noguchi Announces Plans for Fall Half Marathon

http://www.sponichi.co.jp/sports/news/2010/08/27/11.html

translated by Brett Larner

Back to full training for the first time since a left thigh injury knocked her out of the 2008 Beijing Olympics, women's marathon national record holder and Athens Olympics marathon gold medalist Mizuki Noguchi (32, Team Sysmex) announced on Aug. 26 that she plans to make a return this year with a half marathon.

In July Noguchi went to Sugadaira, Nagano for her first full-effort gasshuku training camp since the injury. She is currently training in Hokkaido together with her teammates, where she has extended her long runs up to the 30 km level. Team Sysmex coach Hisakazu Hirose commented, "She's back to running like her old self. This fall or winter Mizuki will do a half marathon."

Noguchi has not run a race since her victory at the Sendai International Half Marathon on May 11, 2008.* She has been talking discreetly with several domestic and overseas races to find the option best-suited for her comeback. Looking toward the 2012 London Olympics, Noguchi's first major checkpoint will be next summer's World Championships marathon in Daegu, Korea and its domestic selection races January through March next year.

*Translator's note: Noguchi's last race before her injury was actually the anchor leg of a 4 X 400 m relay on May 18, 2008 at the Kansai Jitsugyodan Track and Field Championships. Click here for photos.

This isn't the first time Sysmex has announced that Noguchi was ready for a comeback race, but this time they do sound serious. Should Noguchi opt for a domestic half marathon it would likely be November's final running of the Kobe Women's Half Marathon. The only other option would be the Sanyo Women's Road Race in late December.

Comments

keens sandals said…
I'm not actually familiar with Japanese marathon but after reading your post I learned a lot. It made me interested.
______________
-- Life can only be understood backwards, but it must be lived forward. ~Soren Kierkegaad

Most-Read This Week

Morii Surprises With Second-Ever Japanese Sub-2:10 at Boston

With three sub-2:09 Japanese men in the race and good weather conditions by Boston standards the chances were decent that somebody was going to follow 1981 winner Toshihiko Seko 's 2:09:26 and score a sub-2:10 at the Boston Marathon . But nobody thought it was going to be by a 2:14 amateur. Paris Olympic team member Suguru Osako had taken 3rd in Boston in 2:10:28 in his debut seven years ago, and both he and 2:08 runners Kento Otsu and Ryoma Takeuchi were aiming for spots in the top 10, Otsu after having run a 1:01:43 half marathon PB in February and Takeuchi of a 2:08:40 marathon PB at Hofu last December. A high-level amateur with a 2:14:15 PB who scored a trip to Boston after winning a local race in Japan, Yuma Morii told JRN minutes before the start of the race, "I'm not thinking about time at all. I'm going to make top 10, whatever time it takes." Running Boston for the first time Morii took off with a 4:32 on the downhill opening mile, but after that  Sis

The Ivy League at the Izumo Ekiden in Review

Last week I was contacted by Will Geiken , who I'd met years ago when he was a part of the Ivy League Select Team at the Izumo Ekiden . He was looking for historical results from Izumo and lists of past team members, and I was able to put together a pretty much complete history, only missing the alternates from 1998 to 2010 and a little shaky on the reverse transliterations of some of the names from katakana back into the Western alphabet for the same years. Feel free to send corrections or additions to alternate lists. It's interesting to go back and see some names that went on to be familiar, to see the people who made an impact like Princeton's Paul Morrison , Cornell's Max King , Stanford's Brendan Gregg in one of the years the team opened up beyond the Ivy League, Cornell's Ben de Haan , Princeton's Matt McDonald , and Harvard's Hugo Milner last year, and some of the people who struggled with the format. 1998 Team: 15th of 21 overall, 2:14:10 (43

Hirabayashi Runs PB at Shanghai Half, WR Holder Nakata Dominates Fuji Five Lakes - Weekend Road Roundup

Returning to the roads after his 2:06:18 win at February's Osaka Marathon, Kiyoto Hirabayashi (Koku Gakuin University) took 5th at Sunday's Shanghai Half Marathon in a PB 1:01:23, just under a minute behind winner Roncer Kipkorir Konga (Kenya) who clocked a CR 1:00:29. After inexplicably running the equivalent of a sub-59 half marathon to win the Hakone Ekiden's Third Stage, Aoi Ota (Aoyama Gakuin Univ.) was back to running performances consistent with his other PBs with a 1:02:30 for 8th. His AGU teammate Kyosuke Hiramatsu was 10th in 1:04:00. Women's winner Magdalena Shauri (Tanzania) also set a new CR in 1:09:57. Aoyama Gakuin runners took the top four spots in the men's half marathon at the Aomori Sakura Marathon , with Hakone alternate Kosei Shiraishi getting the win in 1:04:32 and B-team members Shunto Hamakawa and Kei Kitamura 2nd and 3rd in 1:04:45 and 1:04:48. Club runners took the other division titles, Hina Shinozaki winning the women's half