Naturalized Kenyan Shadrack Koech clocked 2 hours 14 minutes 7 seconds to finish seventh in the marathon at the Asian Games in Japan, infohub.kz reports.
The Kazakhstani distance runner finished four minutes behind the winner, Japan's Ichitaka Yamashita. Had Koech run close to his personal best of 2:04.04, he could have contended for gold.
So far, Kazakhstan's athletics team has collected only silver and bronze. Koech fell short of those medals as well.
ASIAN GAMES 2026
September 26. Marathon. Men
🥇 1. Ichitaka YAMASHITA (Japan) – 2:10.49
🥈 2. Sevan BARWAL (India) – 2:11.37
🥉 3. PEIYU FEN (China) – 2:12.13
…7. Shadrack KOECH (Kazakhstan) – 2:14.07
No Kazakhstani women took part in the women's marathon.
The XX Summer Asian Games officially opened on September 19 and will close on October 4. Athletes from 45 countries are competing for 460 sets of medals. Kazakhstan's team at the 2026 Asian Games comprises 558 athletes in 35 sports.
On the first day of the Games, Kazakhstan won four gold medals. Cyclists Rinata Sultanova and Alexey Lutsenko, along with karateka Zholaman Bigabyl and Sofya Berultseva, became Games champions. MMA fighter Yerkingali Burkutalin added a fifth gold to the team's tally, and his mixed martial arts teammate Kadyrbek Shynbayev claimed the sixth. On September 23, Lutsenko became a two-time champion of the 2026 Asian Games. The eighth gold medal was won on September 24 by rowers Vladislav Yakovlev and Ivan Chernukhin in the men's coxless pairs.
After six days of competition, Kazakhstan stood fourth in the unofficial medal standings.