JUNE 2013

LOOKING BACK, LOOKING AHEAD

JUNE

• Dan Newman is back in New York and is cleaning up in the local races. On the 1st (I think) he “sprinted” to victory in the hilly Spring Sprint for St. Vincent’s Hospital in Harrison, crossing the line in “less than 19 minutes,” according to the news report.
• On the 2nd, Namban’s version of Japan’s most popular runner Yuki Kawauchi (lots of races), Raymond Wong, ran the Kita Marathon along the Arakawa. It was a hot day, but he ran an evenly paced race to finish in 3:11:37, 34th out of 1,269 men.
• On the same day, five Nambanners participated in the Fuji-Oshino Trail Race (31.7km), rated one of the top 100 races in Japan due to nice views of Mt. Fuji. Lots of up and down, needless to say. Harrisson Uk took club honors by finishing 52nd overall in 4:12. Derek Leong was 136th in 4:43 and Yuki Seshimo was close behind him in 4:45, 10th woman out of 71. Satohi Numasawa came in 15th in 5:00:03, and Meeks Kume walked and photographed the course in 6:55.
• Eric Lebrasseur and his wife Yuki Seshimo traveled up to Nagano pref. for the Sugadaira Trail race on the 16th. 42km and 2,500m of elevation gain! Despite having two bad knees and having only run 40km in the previous 5 weeks, Eric finished 38th out of 300 men in 6:29:36. Yuki was not far behind, in 6:39:31, good for 4th out of 27 women and 1st in her age group.
• On the 23rd, two Namban men and two women challenged themselves with the tough Norikura Tenku 30km Road Race. Tough because the course starts at 1,500m elevation, climbs to 2,700m, then drops to 1,800m (in the winter, it’s a ski course). High walls of snow at the top! Takeshi Koide finished in 2:44, closely followed by Derek Leong in 2:47 (111th out of about 1,500). 3 minutes also separated the women: Rie Onodera in 3:03 and Chika Kanai in 3:06 (22nd out of 500).

JULY

Namban workouts on Wednesday nights at Oda track from 7:25pm.
• 3 – 1000 x 6
• 10 – 1200 1200 1200 1000 1000 400
• 17 – 600 800 1000 1200 1000 800 600
• 24 – 400 x 12 (A), 400 x 12 or 10 (B), 400 x 10 (C)
• 27 – Run/dinner in Kamakura
• 31 – 5000m time trial

HAIKU OF THE MONTH

Does it matter which?
Dripping sweat or rainwater
Hot and wet July