Getting my bearings here in Tokyo...
It's almost bedtime here in Tokyo, and it was a productive day as I'm getting my bearings after leaving Seattle on Tuesday, and losing Wednesday with the time change.
Since I last was in Asia in 2015 for two trips to Guiyang and Beijing, I'd forgotten how much harder it is to go to Asia from the West Coast as opposed to going to Europe.
I got a rude reminder when I woke up at 3:30 am hungry, then couldn't go back to sleep, so I fired off some emails to the US, and went for an hour run/walk at 6 am before the hustle and bustle of another workday in the Shinjuku district of Tokyo.
After figuring out how to get to Japan National Stadium on the subway, I went to pick up my credentials, along with a nice little gift bag from ASICS, featuring a Pocari Sweat water bottle encased in a wood box, plus the essential IC card preloaded in order to use the city's subway and transit system.
Walked around the Japan National Stadium to get an idea of where you can and can't go and trying to figure out possible camera angles.
Ran into Seattle resident and my spotter at the UW indoor track meets at the Dempsey, Kevin Saylors (photo courtesy Tokyo 2025 LOC).
For those who haven't been to a track meet at the Dempsey, Kevin is the guy who keeps me honest while I'm announcing a meet. He's the one providing me with leaders and split times, as well as the progress of a field event happening while a race is going on.
Kevin is so good at what he does that he's working here in Tokyo as the spotter for the NBC Sports announce team. He's covered or attended 19 out of a possible 20 world championships, as well as numerous Olympics. His services are used by many of the top meets in the USA and around the world. Millrose and the New Balance Indoor Games uses Kevin, which is why I don't have him for the full slate of meets hosted by the Huskies.
I'm just lucky that he lives in Seattle, and that the University of Washington track program gets to have him by my side when he's not at his real job at Boeing!
Some news:
--Due to expected elevated heat conditions that could pose a health and safety risk to competing athletes, all road events on the first three days of the World Athletics Championships Tokyo 2025 will start 30 minutes earlier than scheduled.
The new start time for the women’s and men’s 35 Kilometers Race Walk on Saturday 13 September, Women’s Marathon on Sunday 14 September, and Men’s Marathon on Monday 15 September is 07:30am.
According to the media advisory from World Athletics, despite the World Championships being scheduled for mid-September when temperatures were expected to be lower than during the summer in Tokyo, levels this year have remained at those of mid-summer.
This time change affects 35k race walker Katie Burnett, who now lives in Olympia, and competes on Saturday, and marathoner and former Brooks Beast Jessica McClain, who races Sunday.
--Back in the States, Washington State hosts the Cougar Classic at the Colfax Golf Club outside of Pullman Friday afternoon.
The women's 6k race starts at 5 pm, and the men's 8k race closes the day of competition at 5:45 pm.
Besides the host Cougars, teams entered include Central Washington, Eastern Washington, Gonzaga, Lewis-Clark, Montana, and SeattleU,
There's a couple of press conferences happening in Tokyo on Friday that we'll try to cover, plus the traditional day before the meet appearances by the teams at the stadium.
NOTE: World Athletics, and the sports information office of Washington State contributed to this report.
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