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steveo

mine to stay the same please
Joined
Aug 30, 2005
Messages
7,545
Yamauchi was born in Oxford, Oxfordshire, England to Dorothy and Norman Myers but lived with her family until she was 8 years old in Nairobi, Kenya.[3] She started running with Oxford club, Headington Road Runners, while still at school, but took up running seriously when she was an undergraduate at university, competing mainly in cross-country races. After graduating at St Anne's College, Oxford (Politics, Philosophy & Economics)[4] she studied a one year Master’s degree at the London School of Economics. During this time she joined Parkside AC (now Harrow AC) and was coached by Bob Parker, who coached David Bedford, former 10,000m world record-holder and current director of the Flora London marathon. After finishing her studies, Yamauchi joined the British Foreign Ministry, the Foreign and Commonwealth Office (FCO), in 1996. In 1997 she earned her first GB vest, finishing 38th in the European Cross Country championships. In 1998 she won the English National Cross Country championships.

From 1998 to 2002 she took a break form athletics, focusing on her work at the British Embassy, Tokyo, Japan. In 2002 she married Shigetoshi Yamauchi, a Japanese national. After returning to live in the UK in 2002, she started running seriously again, under the FCO’s flexible working scheme which enabled her to job-share and then work part-time. She ran her first marathon in April 2004 at the London marathon, placing 17th in 2:39:16. She also earned selection for GB again, running in the Chiba ekiden relay race in Japan in November 2004. In 2005 she ran her second marathon (2:31:52) at London, earning selection for the 2005 World Championships in Athletics in Helsinki, Finland, where she finished 18th and won a team bronze medal. In November 2005 she ran another PB, this time in the Tokyo International Women’s marathon (2:27:38).

In December 2005 she was selected for GB’s support scheme for elite athletes, the Lottery-funded UK Sport World Class Performance Programme. In January 2006 she took unpaid leave from the FCO to focus on preparing for the 2008 Beijing Olympic marathon, and moved to Tokyo, Japan with her husband. Yamauchi won the bronze medal at the 2006 Commonwealth Games 10,000m race. In April 2006 she became the 2nd fastest British woman ever behind world record-holder Paula Radcliffe, finishing 6th in the London marathon (2:25:13). On September 10, 2006 Yamauchi won the Rotterdam Half Marathon finishing in 1:10:36 beating Mindaye Gishu who won the Rotterdam Marathon earlier that year and Japanese Aya Manome. On 22 April 2007 Yamauchi was the leading Briton in the London Marathon, finishing 6th.

In April 2007 she joined Second Wind AC, a new club set up in Japan by Manabu Kawagoe, the former coach of the Shiseido Running Club. She set a new personal best in winning the 2008 Osaka Marathon in a time of 2:25:10.

At the 2008 Summer Olympics in Beijing, Mara equalled the best performance by a British woman in the marathon by finishing 6th in a time of 2 hrs 27 mins 29 secs.

Good show Mara.

79yamauchi_468x661.jpg
 
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Unquestionably for me the marathon is a very dull sport to watch but every time I see the times they run 26 miles in, I'm staggered. Utmost respect but unfortunately I'm not more likely to watch than I am, say Iron Man competitions.
 
Hurray for Mara. Shocking how Radcliffe fixated the media is.

To be fair to Radcliffe (fellow Loughborough graduate - screw LSE!), she has run 4 of the 5 fastest recorded marathon times by any woman ever. It's not surprising that she gets the press just as any Champ late in their career tends to.
 
Unquestionably for me the marathon is a very dull sport to watch but every time I see the times they run 26 miles in, I'm staggered. Utmost respect but unfortunately I'm not more likely to watch than I am, say Iron Man competitions.

Indeed. I can't say I have ever watched an entire marathon, but I have the utmost respect for someone that can run that far and fast. They would run a marathon in about 20 minutes more than I would manage a half marathon, and that's the women!

How can anyone run at about 21km/h for two hours?
 
Indeed. I can't say I have ever watched an entire marathon, but I have the utmost respect for someone that can run that far and fast. They would run a marathon in about 20 minutes more than I would manage a half marathon, and that's the women!

How can anyone run at about 21km/h for two hours?

To beat the ladies' world record, you would need to run at 18.6km/h for 2 and a quarter hours.

To beat the men's one.....umm... you'd need to go at about 20.2.

I'm not even convinced that my sprint is that quick...double check....a 100m dash at that speed would take 17.7s.

Does the :yikes: smiley still exist?
 
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