The Tokyo List

Gareth says:

I have here a list of people who will run Tokyo marathon. With times. For your information, entertainment and speculation. Speaking of which, a fair few of these projections look a bit soft to me. Any comments? (I know the names and times are a bit jammed together, but that's the software, not me.)

I HAVE AMENDED THIS. For some reason, the first posting dropped everybody after Matthias. I hope it now covers everyone.

Adam B 3:10
Adam Y 3:15
Akira 3:30
Anthony 3:10
Bob 3:10
Brett 2:29
Carol 3:30
Chiba 4:15
Chika 3:25
Chris 3:08
Colin 3:10
David 3:08
Dayan 4:15
Frank 4:00
Gareth 3:30
Gary C 3:40
Gary E 3:30
Gordon
Grainne 4:00
Greg 2:42:30
Ingo 3:10
Jason 3:30
Jay 3:05
Jaynie 3:45
Katakura 3:45
Keren 3:30
Luke 5:00
Mary 3:40
Martin V 3:00
Matthias 3:20
Mika K 3:34
Mika T 3:05:35
Okazaki K
Paddy 3:25
Paul
Peter A 3:30
Phil 4:00
Philippe
Renald 4:00
Rie
Sally 4:00
Shiba 3:30
Steve 3:00
Stuart 3:10
Taeko
Taro
Terry 3:10
Tom 3:35
Yasuko
Yoshida K 2:45
Yuka 4:00
Yumiko Finish!

Tokyo Times

Here’s a topic that’s perfect for this forum, not least of all because a lot of the people who could be, should be (why aren’t you?) reading this are thinking about it: What will I run at Tokyo? Hoping to unleash a flood of discussion, here’s my take.

My training for Tokyo opened with a determination to run below my 3:11 PB. Until the beginning of this year, I would have said I was edging towards that. A great end of year 30k in Osaka, a better 35k on the first Sunday of January; Wednesday night speed plus distance workouts that exceeded expectations; comfortable tempo runs; consistently rising mileage. Everything was pointing in the right direction and looking good.

But on January 14, I got the unwanted birthday present of the Sunday run from hell. I plodded a lonely course through Yoyogi, watching the pack run away from me, dwindle and disappear, leaving me to run at a pace below that of my Saturday slow (recovery pace) runs. Nothing else I could do! Wednesdays were the same, as both speed and distance slipped away. There was no apparent rhyme or reason for this abrupt and then persistent decline. No pain, no fatigue, no trouble sleeping; and I was sleeping long enough, seven hours a night. I eased off mileage to see if that helped, but it made no apparent difference. Racing a slow leg at Shibuya ekiden only confirmed what I already knew: Bye bye 3:11.

So, here we are. Seventeen days out. I did 98 plus change at Shinjuku half. Way too slow for a 3:11 full marathon. For the moment I’m hoping I’ve settled at this level, that the deterioration will not go on, and that I will manage to finish Tokyo under 3:30. Let us see what we shall see.

Gareth