According to a blogger  Tanvir Kazmi :

"Tokyo marathon upped the participation limit to 35,000 this year, 5000 more than the last year. For these 35,000 slots, a total of 261,981people applied, which means 1 out of every 7.5 got selected. Last years number was 1 out of 4.7 applicants."

However, as far as I know almost every applicant here had been accepted. Perhaps this favouritism was to promote tourism.

My round trip ticket (ANA) plus 3 nights at Shinjuku Asuka Hotel (semi-double bedroom) costed a little over HK$ 4400 /hd ( travelling with my wife this time)

However, the saving could not measure up to the loss of sleep on the plane. The flight began at 0205 hrs on 21st and landed at 0700 in Haneda Airport. I wonder if this was worthy.

Before check-in I had to pick up my runner pack at Tokyo Big Sight, Odaiba.

We checked out the Expo and had this picture taken (one of the freebies). The time of 2:07:23 was of course the winner of 2008 : Victor Rothlun's

We collected many sovenirs given away by the Expo participants.

As we had been to Odaiba not long ago we did not bother to tour this part of the city again. So we just returned to hotel for much needed rest.

The hotel is at 5-minutes walking distance from the Japan Railways Okubo Station. The hotel can also be reached from the Shinjuku Station of the Japan Railways, located at a walking distance of 10 minutes

There was one supermarket one block away. A 7-11 convenience store was just on the ground floor.

I tried very hard to sleep. But the loss could not be made up this way though.

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Race day

The start was at the Tokyo Metropolitan Government Building and finish at the Tokyo  Big Sight

We walked about 10 minutes to the venue.

The weather was just cool 16 degrees celsius but very windy.

I was assigned the start block ID of E. Therefore I waited for more than 6 minutes before I stepped on the timing mat.

Of course I was preceded by the block A runners

Then came yours truly on the far end, the guy with the yellowish green vest.

The start scene in animation.

If one cares to wait for 6'56 one will see a runner wearing yellowish green vest and sunglasses on the far right.

This film below captures at least 3 well known HK runners within its 2 minutes shooting. In the order of appearance : Lam Shing Yip aka 火車頭 aka Thomas; Mok Chi Ling aka Speedpurple aka Betty: Leung Wai Hung aka 村長

Many runners were in outlandish costumes

But the top of my list is this. Had it not been for their generosity to show off their well-endowed figures the race would become a lacklustre one. Too bad they were running slow to parade before the million feasting eyes. Otherwise I loved to have them as my pacers.

As for my performance it was a little letdown. Never expecting a record breaking occasion though, I intended to be slightly better. The splits according to my watch were:

(The first 10K was on the descent. The pace could be easily quickened)

1-2K 11'15 3-4K 10'39 5. 5'04 (26'58) 6. 5'17 7. 5'12 8. 5'19 9. 5'22 10. 5'20 (26'34)

(A 53' plus first 10k. Should be on the right track. But I slowed down during the next 10K )

11. 5'29 12. 5'20 13. 5'24 14. 5'29 15. 5'22 (27'06) 16. 5'26 17. 5'22
18. 5'27 19. 5'21 20. 5'23 (27'03)  21. 5'32  H/M 32"(1:53:44)

(Thereafter, I started to shadow one pacer accompanying one partially blind runner. This lasted almost up to 36th Km when they did not come forward. Perhaps the disabled runner ran out of steam.) 

22. 4'57 23. 5'24 24. 5'26 25. 5'24  (27'10)26. 5'39 27. 5'29 28. 5'39 29. 5'23 30. 5'27(27'39) (2:42:35)

31.5'27 32. 5'34 33. 5'34 34. 5'31
35. 5'37(27'46)

(36K on there were inclines up the bridges and the gale forces were blowing against us from the opposite direction.  This affected even the prize winners. That was why a total of 3 minutes had been incurred by the overall champion.)

36. 6'04 37. 5'56 38. 5'46 39. 6'05 40. 5'41(29'33) (3:39:55)

(The last K was again an uphill terrain.)

41. 6'03 195M 1'15 42 5'26 (3:52:40)

Official result  in the form of a certificate received on 6.5.09

official time : 3:59.09

net time : 3:52:42

The following link is my record according to gun time

http://p.tokyo42195.org/numberfile/27171.html

The following animation recorded my touching the finishing line.

http://wwwz.fujitv.co.jp/sports/marathon/tm2009/goalscene.html?GOALTIME=03:59:08&GATE=b&EVENTCODE=1

Race Course Elevation Map

The male champion Salim Kipsang

The female champion  Mizuho Nasukawa

Running her final marathon before her retirement 土佐礼子 slipped and hurt herself at the 5K. But she still persevered and soldiered on right up to the end and finished 3rd. We could see the sharp contrast of a super strong woman crossing the finish and became a weakling hugging her husband for reassurance. As her secret admirer I felt sad. But I was thrilled to find her once on the other side heading me over 10K, an enormous margin.

The entry fee was : 12000 yen. It was one of the most expensive marathons I ever ran.

There were a total of 247 entrants from Hong Kong (not counting some put down China as their place of origin)

As far as I know at least the following 6 HK runners had their sub-3 runs according to the official time.

Fung Sze yuen : 2:59:24

Chan Ho Cheong aka Iceman : 2:58:97

Lau Yiu Fun Jonathon : 2:55:55

Wong Wing Tak (the nurse) : 2:56:36

Chung Yu Ho Dominc (the coach) : 2:51:12

Lee Chung Leung : 2:56:50

So Wing Kuen Edward ( net time?)

The list was not meant to be exhaustive. I just out of curiosity checked out those on the early part of the entry list only.