Posted: September 10, 2007

Athletics (RRW): Women's World 100-K Record Set

From David Monti © 2007 Race Results Weekly, all rights reserved RaceResultsWeekly.com At last Saturday's Stichting Ultraloop Winschoten in Holland, host of the IAU World Cup 100-K Championships, Norimi Sakurai of Japan came tantalizingly close to breaking the seven hour barrier, recording a new world road record for the distance of 7:00:27. According to records kept by the Association of Road Racing Statisticians (ARRS), the previous record was 7:00:48 by American Ann Trason set on the same 10 km, ten-loop course in Winschoten back in 1995. Tomoe Abe of Japan ran faster on a point-to-point course in Yubetsu, Japan, in 2000 (6:33:11), but that mark is not recognized as a world record because of the possible aid of wind or gravity. In the men's race, the Japanese went 1-2 with Shinichi Watanabe (6:23:21) and Kenji Nakanishi (6:30:21) the first to finish. Subscribe to the Runner's Web Weekly Digest