Fukushi and Ndungu win Marugame half marathon
Samuel Ndungu and Kayoko Fukushi won the men’s and women’s division of 65th annual Marugame Half marathon, respectively. Fukushi, the course record holder, won the race by running alone for the most of the race, while Ndungu had to fight hard for the victory with Tsuyoshi Ugachi - Ken Nakamura reports.
In the men’s race, pre-race favorite Mekubo Mogusu, Kenyan who runs for corporate team Aidem took the lead immediately and pushed the pace from the start. Mogusu covered the first Km in 2:43 and by 2Km he was running alone front of the cahse pack including Ndungu, Kisri and Ugachi. Mogusu covering the first 5Km in 14:00, eight second ahead of the chase pack including Ndungu, Ugachi, Rachid Kisri and Girma Tolla. The pace was only two seconds behind the pace when he set a course record, 59:48.
By 10Km (28:12) Mogusu was 21 seconds ahead of Ndungu, Ugachi and Kisri. Starting around 11Km, Kisiri started to fall behind Ndungu and Ugachi. Mogusu’s lead over Ndungu and Ugachi increased to 34 seconds in the next 5Km and it looked as if he was going to win another Marugame Half marathon, having won in 2007 and 2009. However, Mogusu slowed down in the next 5Km, taking 15:08, and Ndungu caught Mogusu just after 20Km. Ugachi also caught Mogusu a few hundred meters later. Mogusu was unable to stay with them. Ndungu slowly pulled away from Ugachi in the final Km.
Although Ugachi closed the gap on the final lap on the track, at the end Ndungu, who runs for Japanese corporate team Aichi Steel, won by three seconds with 1:00:55, personal best by 22 seconds. Ugachi was second with 1:00:58. Not only it was a personal best by more than 50 seconds for Ugachi, but it was also the third fastest time by Japanese, behind the current national record of 1:00:25 by Atsushi Sato and the former national record of 1:00:30 by Ken-ichi Takahashi.
“I fulfilled my goal of breaking 61 minutes for the half marathon today. My next goal is to make the World Championships 10000m team,” said Ugachi after the race.
Mogusu finished third, taking more than 3 minutes and 40 seconds for the final 2.1Km. We wonder about his performance in the upcoming Tokyo Marathon.
The women’s race, billed as Abeylegesse versus Fukushi never materialized, for the Olympic silver medalist pulled out of the race a day before.
By 2.5Km, Fukushi was running alone, at least 10 seconds ahead of the chase pack including Skvortsova, Fujinaga, and Notagashira. Fukushi covered 5Km in 15:56, nearly 30 seconds ahead of the chase pack.
Fukushi passed 10Km in 32:09, nearly 50 seconds ahead of the chase pack, now consists of Rei Ohara and Mika Yoshikawa. By 13Km, Ohara left Yoshikawa behind. Although Fukushi started to slow after 10Km, other runners slowed even more, so Fukushi won comfortably more than a minute and half ahead of Karolina Jarzynska of Poland who came from behind to capture second.
It was third victory for Fukushi at the Marugame half marathon, having won in 2006 and 2007, but she was not happy with her winning time of 1:09:00, her slowest time in Marugame. Fukushi stayed undefeated at the half marathon distance. Rei Ohara finished third in her half marathon debut with 1:10:50, quite a respectable time for the 20 years old, less than two years out of high school. Mika Yoshikawa, five time 1500m national champion, was fourth with 1:11:13, nearly two minutes improvement on her personal best. Her future at longer distance may be bright.
Weather: Sunny; temperature: 5.6C, humidity: 58%; wind: 0.8m/s North North East
Report by Ken Nakamura
