This weekend I visited Shimoda four hours south of Tokyo to interview Yoshihisa Hosaka about his background and training for his 60+ world record at the Feb. 1 Beppu-Oita Mainichi Marathon. I’ve worked at various times with a range of well-known musicians, artists, dancers, athletes and biologists and can honestly say that Hosaka is the most interesting person I have ever met. The interview will appear in the June issue of Running Times magazine, available April 28.
With renewed confidence, Japan's Olympic marathon team will face the total 438 m elevation difference hills of Paris this summer. The members of the women's and men's marathon teams for August's Paris Olympics appeared at a press conference in Tokyo on Mar. 25 in conjunction with the Japan Marathon Championship Series III (JMC) awards gala. Women's Olympic trials winner Yuka Suzuki (Daiichi Seimei) said she was riding a wave of motivation in the wake of the new women's national record. When she watched Honami Maeda (Tenmaya) set the record at January's Osaka International Women's Marathon on TV, Suzuki said she was, "absolutely stunned." Her coach Sachiko Yamashita told her afterward, "When someone breaks the NR, things change," and Suzuki found herself saying, "I want to take my shot." After training for a great run in Paris, she said, "I definitely want to break the NR in one of my marathons after that." Mao
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