{"id":295296,"date":"2019-03-11T06:06:53","date_gmt":"2019-03-10T20:06:53","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/?p=295296"},"modified":"2019-03-11T06:06:53","modified_gmt":"2019-03-10T20:06:53","slug":"japanese-conquer-saipan-marathon","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/japanese-conquer-saipan-marathon\/","title":{"rendered":"Japanese conquer Saipan Marathon"},"content":{"rendered":"
Japanese Yoshiyuki Ono celebrates his first place finish in last Saturday\u2019s 2019 Saipan Marathon.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Japanese runners dominated the men\u2019s division of last Saturday\u2019s 2019 Saipan Marathon, while three CNMI residents made it to the podium in the women\u2019s field.<\/p>\n

Forty-year-old Yoshiyuki Ono proved that age is just a number, as he led the finishers in the full marathon event after clocking in at 2:38:32. He was the oldest among the Top 6 overall finishers in the men\u2019s division of the race that started and ended at the American Memorial Park with turnaround points at Banzai Cliff in Marpi up north and Pacific Islands Club Saipan in San Antonio down south.<\/p>\n

Ono completed the longest race of the day more than a minute ahead of compatriot and 32-year-old Taku Fujiwara, who checked in at 2:39:39. Two other Japanese runners made it to the Top 6. Twenty-six-year-old Seiji Shiroki and 22-year-old Satoshi Endo were ranked sixth and fifth after finishing the 42K event in 2:59:43 and 3:00:14, respectively. Meisong Ji, an 18-year-old runner from China, placed third after timing in at 2:44:13, while 33-year-old Ryan Matienzo of Guam came in at fourth following his time of 2:44:47.<\/p>\n

In the women\u2019s division, Saipan resident Kaylee Heath was the fastest among the host\u2019s runners after registering 3:32:29 and finished second behind Japan\u2019s Natsuko Muramatsu (3:28:25). Heather Taylor and Sakiko Eda were the two other Saipan residents to make it to the Top 6 overall with the former recording a third-best 3:42:39 and the latter logging 3:48:20 (fifth best in the division). Guam\u2019s Dianne Marie Sapida (3:41:17) and Japan\u2019s Risa Yoshida (3:53:17) rounded out the Top 6, who received plaques and cash prizes during the awards ceremony held at the Fiesta Resort & Spa Saipan last Saturday night.<\/p>\n

The Marianas Visitors Authority, which organized the race, also recognized the top placers in various age groups, awarding them with medals besides the ones for finishers <\/p>\n

In the 16 to 19 division, Agape Christian School runners Chenxuan Yang and Irish He Zhang were the winners after clocking in at 4:47:34 and 7:05:12. Other top finishers in their age groups were 20 to 29\u2019s Naoki Sakamoto (3:12:48) and Haeran Gwon (4:22:39), 30 to 39\u2019s Tiantian Wang (3:21:11) and Xinli Zhang (4:54:31), 40 to 49\u2019s Seiji Adahi (3:03:49) and Tinian Kimberly King-Hinds (4:09:15), 50 to 59\u2019s Jongboum Choi (3:21:265) and Yaling Zhu (4:22:31), and over 60\u2019s Sheguo Wang (3:43:35).<\/p>\n

Meanwhile, in the half marathon event, former Saipan resident Mieko Carey managed to barge into the Top 6 after submitting 1:45:03. She finished fifth behind Saipan\u2019s Noriko Jim (1:45:01), while China\u2019s Jia Yang ruled the event after checking in at 1:25:40. China\u2019s Wu Yang Fei (1:33:06), Korea\u2019s Sunok Hwang (1:33:31), and China\u2019s Zhang Yongbo (1:39:28) completed the Top 6.<\/p>\n

In the men\u2019s field, the first placer is also from China with 22-year-old You Jun Jie finishing the 21K race in 1:16:34. Jie made it to the finish line just four seconds ahead of Japan\u2019s Fenta Saito (1:16:38), while China\u2019s Yunfeng Huang (1:17:47) and Xiao Yu Sun (1:24:13) and Japan\u2019s Akinori Tachibana (1:19:17) and Masashi Saito (1:20:16) rounded out the Top 6.<\/p>\n

The half marathon race also started and ended at AMP with a turnaround point at PIC.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Japanese runners dominated the men\u2019s division of last Saturday\u2019s 2019 Saipan Marathon, while three CNMI…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":29,"featured_media":295298,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[3134],"class_list":["post-295296","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-sports","tag-saipan-marathon"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/295296","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/29"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=295296"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/295296\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/295298"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=295296"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=295296"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=295296"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}