Ethiopia&rsquo;s Tsegaye Kebede and Kenya&rsquo;s Martin Mathathi are the favourites for the fifth annual Gifu Seiryu Half Marathon on Sunday (17), with the IAAF Silver Label Road Race also known as the Naoko Takahashi Cup.Although the defending champion and course record holder, Kenya&rsquo;s Bedan Karoki, unfortunately withdrew from the race a week ago, the field is still a strong one. As well as sub-one-hour men Kebede and Mathathi, there are two more runners who have run faster than 61 minutes: the Kenyan pair of James Rungaru and Jacob Wanjuki.Mathathi won this race in 2012 and was second in 2013. He has cracked 60 minutes for the half marathon twice: 59:48 at the 2010 Sendai Half Marathon and 58:56 at the 2011 Great North Run.He has raced sparingly since winning the 2013 Fukuoka Marathon with a personal best of 2:07:16. His latest half marathon was more than a year ago in Marugame, which he won with 1:00:11.Kebede is a truly world-class marathon runner with a best of 2:04:38.&nbsp; He races at non-marathon distance sparingly, but early in his career, at the 2008 RAK Half Marathon, Kebede ran his best for the distance when he clocked 59:35 and finished a close second to Patrick Makau. He also won the 2008 Great North Run with 59:45.His last race was at the 2015 Tokyo Marathon where he was only eighth with 2:07:58. By comparison, Mathathi&rsquo;s last race was over 10,000m on the track three weeks ago, when he won with a relatively modest time of 28:14.24.&nbsp;&nbsp; On paper, the race looks to be between Mathathi and Kebede but there are some question marks over their current form.If both co-favourites falter, then Rungaru, who just recorded a half marathon personal best of 1:00:12 at the 2015 Nice Half Marathon only three weeks ago, may rise to the occasion.Next fastest in the field is Wanjuki, who has a PB of 1:00:32, which was recorded in Japan at the 2010 Nagoya Half Marathon.&nbsp; This year, Wanjuki returned to form and ran 1:00:48 three months ago in Marugame, the second-fastest half marathon of his career. He also ran 1:01:05 in Yamaguchi earlier this year.Four other runners in the field have gone faster than 1:02. Australia&rsquo;s Ben St. Lawrence may also surprise. Although his half marathon best is only 1:02:51, and is three years old, he recorded 27:44.24 for 10,000m on the track just two weeks ago.The women&rsquo;s field has two sub-1:08 runners and another who has run faster than 1:09.The fastest runner in the field is Kenya&rsquo;s Paskalia Kipkoech, who ran 1:07:17 in 2012 and won the bronze medal at the IAAF World Half Marathon Championships that year.&nbsp; She has run faster than 1:09 four times but has not raced internationally in almost 18 months, since the end of 2013.Ethiopia&rsquo;s Atsede Baysa is a world-class distance runner with a marathon best of 2:22:03 from the 2012 Chicago Marathon and a half marathon best of 1:07:33 from the 2013 Barcelona Half Marathon, but has not been close to that sort of form since the start of 2014.On the other hand, Bahrain&rsquo;s Eunice Kirwa was the 2014 Asian Games marathon winner and has had much better marks in the past 12 months. She ran 1:08:31 for the half marathon in 2014 and then won the 2015 Nagoya Women&rsquo;s Marathon in a national record of 2:22:08 in March.Gifu is the home town of the 2000 Olympic marathon champion and Japanese heroine Naoko Takahashi. The race runs along part of Naoko Takahashi road, where she used to train in her youth, and then finishes at the Gifu Memorial Center Nagara River Stadium, where a statue of Takahashi was erected after her Sydney victory.&nbsp; The men&rsquo;s and women&rsquo;s course records of 1:00:02 and 1:10:03 are held respectively by Karoki from last year and Ethiopia&rsquo;s Mestawet Tufa from 2013. Ken Nakamura for the IAAF

Ethiopia’s Tsegaye Kebede and Kenya’s Martin Mathathi are the favourites for the fifth annual Gifu Seiryu Half Marathon on Sunday (17), with the IAAF Silver Label Road Race also known as the Naoko Takahashi Cup.

Kebede and Mathathi the favourites for the Gifu Seiryu Half Marathon

The Payton Jordan Invitational at Stanford University in Palo Alto on Sunday night (28) produced four world yearly leaders by Emma Coburn and Canadian Matt Hughes in the women’s and men’s Steeplechase, Ben True in the 5000m and Australian Ben St. Lawrence in the 10,000m.It was a busy weekend for Olympic Steeplechase finalist Coburn, as she ran 4:11.36 in the 1500m at the Drake Relays on Friday before heading to California for Sunday’s Steeplechase.Coburn led from the start and then held off a late charge by Jamie Cheever over the final two laps to win, 9:28.86 to 9:29.13. It was a substantial breakthrough for Cheever who came into Sunday’s race with a 9:51.42 PB from the 2012 US Olympic Trials.Coburn felt fatigued on Sunday but pleased with the effort to simulate the conditions that she will have to endure at the IAAF World Championships in Moscow this summer.“In the steeple, if you are tired, you are tired,” said Coburn. “There isn’t another gear you can change to with the barriers. I just tried to close as well as I could.”In the men’s Steeplechase, Hughes outdueled Venezuela’s Jose Gregorio Pena for a meeting record of 8:21.34 to Pena’s 8:22.56 national record. Four runners ran under Pena’s previous world lead (8:27.66), including Hughes’ Canadian compatriot Alexandre Genest.Five men dipped under Elroy Gelant’s previous world-leading mark of 13:16.22 in the 5000m. True, who finished sixth at the IAAF World Cross Country Championships last month, improved his PB by more than six seconds to win in 13:14.44 and triumph in a furious sprint to the finish with steeplechase specialist Evan Jaeger who was second in a 13:14.60 PB.The men’s 10,000m also had a dramatic finish with St. Lawrence outsprinting Japan’s Suguru Osako and Yuki Sato on the homestretch to win the event for the second time in three years. St. Lawrence thrust both arms as he crossed the line in celebration in 27:35.55.Osako was second in 27:38.31 and Sato was third in 27:39.50 as all three were under the World Championships ‘A’ standard of 27:40.00, while 2010 European silver medallist Chris Thompson just missed out on that mark by 0.81.In the 'B' 10,000m, reigning Olympic Triathlon gold medallist Alistair Brownlee of Great Britain finished second in 28:32.48.Kenyan Betsy Saina moved to third on the US collegiate all-time list to win the women’s 10,000m in 31:37.22. Saina shared the lead with New Zealand’s Kim Smith throughout the first 8000m before steadily pulling away. Smith finished fourth in 31:46.37 after being passed on the homestretch by Kenya’s Doricah Obare (31:44.92) and Japan’s Ayumi Hagiwara (31:45.29).London Olympian Kim Conley came from behind in the final 200m to win the women’s 5000m in 15:22.07 over Katie Mackey (15:23.65) and Julia Lucas (15:23.77).There were five meet records set in the 18th annual meet named in honour of the late Payton Jordan, coach of the 1968 US Olympic team. In addition to the ones set by Coburn and Hughes in the Steeplechase, meet records were posted by Treniere Moser in the women’s 1500m with 4:06.40 – her fastest time for six years – and British hammer throwers Sophie Hitchon (70.53m) and Mark Dry (73.75m).Decathlon World record-holder and Olympic champion Ashton Eaton placed third in the Pole Vault with 4.90m.Kirby Lee for the IAAF

Four distance world leads at Stanford

8 December 2012 – Melbourne, Australia – In racing terms, Emmanuel Bett looked a good bet to take the 2012 Zatopek 10,000m race. The world’s fastest man this year, a near miss away from the Kenyan Olympic team, the defending champion and no obvious strong opposition – Bett had most bases covered.No one controls the weather, however, and the weather gods were not smiling on this year’s Zatopek, the 52nd edition of the meeting. The relief of a cool change blowing in a couple of hours before the meeting, dropping the temperature from 37°C to around 20, was tempered by the resultant blustery wind which buffeted the 10,000m runners.Bett ground the opposition into the dust, but the wind and the impact of running into it alone for all but the first three-and-a-half of the 25 laps, held him back to a winning time of 27:59.23, a long way from his target of Luke Kipkosgei’s race record 27:22.54.It was different from last year, when Bett powered through the rain to defeat Kenyan teammates Bidan Karoki (who turned the tables in Eugene to take the third spot in the team for London) and Micah Kogo in 27:39.33.“It was fine while the pacemaker was in, but then I felt (the wind),” said Bett, pointing to his chest to illustrate where it was hitting him. “Maybe next year,” he said of the record.Behind him, London Olympic representative Ben St Lawrence took his third Australian title in 28:35.92, but only after a last-lap battle with the surprising Ben Moreau.Moreau, who finished 11th for England at the Delhi 2010 Commonwealth Games, is now living and working in Sydney. He is registered in Australia, but will not be eligible for a national title until he registers for a second, consecutive year. He was very happy with his 28:40.83, a personal best by “around a minute”, he said. He will run the Beppu Marathon in Japan in February.Spence first American winner of women’s raceNeely Spence set up a number of firsts in winning the women’s race in 32:16.51. It was the debut 10,000m for the 22-year-old who has won numerous NCAA Division II titles for Shippensburg University in Pennsylvania.Indeed, only one American has won the Zatopek before, a young athlete named Galen Rupp who took out the 2006 race from fellow-American Bret Schoolmeester.Rupp has done very nicely for himself since, culminating (so far) in his silver medal behind Mo Farah in the London Olympic 10,000m.Spence may not do that well, but she has the genes to go far. Her father, and her coach until this year, is Steve Spence, the marathon bronze medallist at the Tokyo 1991 World Championships.Australian 1500m Olympic semi-finalist Zoe Buckman did a fine job of setting Spence up, leading for the first eight laps. From there on, she was on her own. She proved a master of tempo, passing through 3000m in 9:40 behind Buckman, 5000m in 16:09 and crossing the line almost 300 metres clear in 32:16.51.Behind her, Lara Tamsett had the worst of her four runs in the Zatopek. The winner in 2008, she has also finished second and third in the intervening years.Clearly struggling, Tamsett only threw off the challenge of third-placed Linda Spencer in the final laps. Her 33:03.84 was her slowest Zatopek time, but led to the sweetest reward. As the only Australian in the race with a World Championships qualifying time – from Stanford in May – her second place and national title win makes her an automatic selection for the World Championships in Moscow.It will be Tamsett’s first World Championships team after narrowly missing out on previous occasions. She was 14th in this year’s IAAF World Half-Marathon Championships in Kavarna, but this will be her first Australian track and field team.In other feature events, James Nipperess took the Bronislaw Malinowski 3000m steeplechase in 8:50.46 while Declan Wilson, a nephew of former New Zealand and Australian representative Peter O’Donoghue, won the de Castella U20 men’s 3000m in 8:07.90. Wilson did most of the leading before losing, then regaining, the lead in a dramatic final lap.Len Johnson for the IAAF