On January 1, 2020, Shanghai will host a number of New Year's running and ascent competitions: Jiading International Circuit has a "Thriving" New Year's Run; Hongkou has a 2020 Hongkou New Year's Day Welcome Run; and Jing'an District will host the 2020 Shanghai Jing'an New Year's Day 10km Welcome Run. In Japan, January 2-3 is the annual "Spring Festival Gala Blockbuster" Hakone Relay Race.
One race: youth, relay and team
The Hakone Relay was a relay race that began in 1920 with kanto regional universities as the team, and was initially contested by four universities. The Hakone Relay was discontinued in the 1940s, but it was revived once a year in 1947 and held on January 2 and 3 every year in 1956. As a result, Hakone became a traditional sporting event and social event for the Japanese New Year.
In addition to the fixed date, the number of Teams participating in the Hakone Relay is also "basically" fixed, at 21. The top 10 in the previous tournament were the "seeded teams", which led directly to the next tournament. So hakone relay not only looks at the championship, but also looks at the top 10. The other 10 spots were decided through the October selection tournament, and the last place was the "Mixed Formation", which was temporarily formed by the players who failed to perform well at the university. However, on every 5 or 10 of the Hakone Relay, 2 teams will be added to the competition. For example, 2019 was the 95th edition of the competition, with 23 teams. The additional 2 places are allocated as follows: 11th place in the qualifiers, and the best performing university team in the past 5 years: the university team that has not passed through and has not won the top 11 places in the qualifiers, but has the highest number of points in the inter-university competition in the past 5 years.
The distance of the Hakone Relay is basically 217 kilometers, divided into 10 stages, and there are 5 stages of competition every day. Each runner ran about the distance of the half marathon (21.1 km), and 10 runners relayed it. As a result, all 10 stages in Hakone have interval records, as well as the outbound (first day) record, the return (second day) record and the total result record. Seven people broke the interval record this year (2019) in the Hakone Relay, and Tunghai University broke the total record in 10 hours, 52 minutes and 09 seconds, ending Aoyama Gakuin's dream of winning the championship for five consecutive years, winning the first championship in 47 years and their last championship in Japan's Heisei era (1989-2019).
Only university students are eligible to participate in the Hakone Relay, so the race day set off a "youth storm" in Japan. The Hakone Relay is a team battle that involves the honor of the school. Runners participating in the Hakone Relay must be within 34 minutes of 10,000 meters. Each team has 10 participants, with a maximum of 16 participants. Due to traffic control considerations, if the participating university teams are slower than the first place in a certain stage, the relay ribbon cannot be passed on to the next player, and the next player can only "advance" the departure, which is equivalent to not completing the relay, which is a "shame" for the university. This often happens in the second half of the schedule, or when a player is injured.
Youth, relay, honor, competition, accident, reversal, Hakone relay has a variety of elements of communication, therefore, the Hakone relay TV broadcast ratings of more than 20%, and the Japanese Spring Festival Gala "Red and White Song Festival" (December 31) became the two most highly received programs in Japan. There are also many books and movies about the Hakone Relay, one of which is known as The Strong Wind (2009).
One character: physical strength, strength and effort
Just like Li Na is to Chinese tennis, Liu Xiang is to Chinese athletics. The hero of the Japanese marathon is Kaniguri Shizo. He broke the marathon world record in 1911 and competed in the Stockholm Olympics in 1912, being the first runner in Asia to participate in a marathon. Kaneari was also the standard-bearer of the Japanese delegation at the 1912 Olympic Games. In 1920 and 1924, he also participated in the Olympic Games twice. Because there was no Olympic Games in 1916, he actually participated in the Olympic Games for three consecutive years.
The greater contribution of The Golden Chestnut Shizo was to promote the development of long-distance running or marathon sports in Japan. He launched the Hakone Relay in 1920, making it Japan's oldest university relay. Many Japanese marathon figures have stepped out of the Hakone Relay. Yuki Kawauchi, known as the "strongest civil servant", represented his alma mater in 2007 and 2009, and participated in the 6th stage of the competition. In 2018 he won the Boston Marathon.
Kanori also launched the Fukuoka International Marathon in 1947. The Tokyo Marathon, the Fukuoka International Marathon, and the Lake Biwa Marathon are the three major marathons in Japan. The Fukuoka International Marathon invites international professionals to participate, and is often a selection contest for runners from Japan.
Golden Chestnut 43 promoted the marathon to take root in Japan, making long-distance running a japanese social phenomenon. Haruki Murakami also wrote a book called "What Do I Talk About When I Talk About Running". Jin Li 43 mentioned six words to the marathon: "physical strength, strength, and hard work." This is actually a true portrayal and epitome of the "spirit of ingenuity" in Japanese society.
A spirit: culture, history and struggle
In Japan, long-distance running has many years of development history, accumulated a deep long-distance running culture, especially in the era of peace and material affluence, long-distance running has become a symbol of Japan's spiritual pursuit and struggle.
In terms of long-distance running alone, Japan participated in the Olympic Marathon in 1912. In 2018, Japan broke the Asian record for the men's marathon twice. Yuki Kawauchi is currently the athlete with the most runs in the world in 210 (2 hours and 10 minutes).
The women's marathon entered the Olympic Games from 1984 and produced 9 gold medals, Japan won 2 (2000, 2004), and China's best result was bronze (2008, Zhou Chunxiu).
At the World Championships in Athletics, The Japanese male athlete won the marathon in 1991 and the female runner won the 1993 and 1997 championships. Chinese athlete Bai Xue won the championship in 2009.
At the Tokyo Marathon, which is the middle of the six Grand Slams, the Japanese men's runner won the championship once (2010) and the women's runner won the championship three times (2007, 2009, 2011).
At the Boston Marathon, Japanese male athletes won the championship nine times (1951, 1953, 1955, 1965, 1966, 1969, 1981, 1987, 2018).
The Tokyo Marathon, which ranked among the world's six Grand Slams in 2013, is known for its zero mortality rate, high completion rate (about 96%) and good service. In 2017, The East Marseille recorded men reaching the 204 mark; women have reached the 220 mark.
Nagoya Women's Marathon is the world's most well-known women's full marathon, attracting about 20,000 women's marathon runners from around the world each time recently.
At next year's Tokyo Olympics, Chinese male and female athletes will have 3 full quotas by the end of 2019. Incomplete statistics show that the Japanese marathon runners are 25 men and 20 women. To this end, in September this year, Japan also regarded the National Marathon Championship as an Olympic selection competition, and the entry threshold was higher than the Olympic registration standard.
One revelation: the university, the foundation and the atmosphere
Returning to the Hakone Relay, we can actually see that in universities, sports have a special educational function. College sports can train players. Yuta Shiraku (Tokyo Marathon, 2:06:11), who broke the Asian Marathon record in 2018, respectively, and Daisuke Daiki (Chicago Marathon, 2:05:50) represented Toyo University and Waseda University in the Hakone Relay in 2010, and won the first and second divisions respectively. The 32-year-old Dong Guojian set the second best result in China; Kipchoge, 35, still "broke 2" under laboratory conditions, and the 37-year-old Becker was only 2 seconds away from the world record in the Berlin Marathon this year. This shows that marathon runners can create good results in their 30s, so universities can become a base for cultivating marathon talents. China's CBA, women's volleyball and men's volleyball leagues all have college players, and the future university is a source of talent for professional leagues. Marathon runners have a long lifespan and can also be the source of high-level runners. Under the guidance of Coach Li Guoqiang of Shanghai Institute of Sport, China's Li Zhixuan entered the 230 mark three times this year, creating 3 best results for female players in China.
Universities also offer a good sporting atmosphere to lay a solid foundation for sport. For example, Tsinghua University has a large number of students participating in the marathon every year; Huang Lisheng, deputy coach of Xiamen University, participated in all 17 Xiamen Marathons, and he also opened a marathon sports and fitness course at the university, which more than 10,000 students have taken in 17 years.
At present, China's marathon has ushered in a period of rapid development. At the professional level, the male athletes are only 13 seconds away from the national record; and the Chinese Athletics Association and Xtep have proposed the "National Race" plan to reward 1 million yuan for the athletes who broke the national record, and each time they break 1 second, they will be rewarded with 10,000 yuan. In terms of improving the amateur level, the "I want to go to the Olympics" program has made positive attempts in setting off the atmosphere of the marathon and selecting amateur runners. In April next year, Changzhou will hold the first "China Marathon Elite Ranking Race and I Want to Participate in the Olympic 10,000 Elite Race". This year, the number of "broken 3s" in North Malaysia (985 people), Guangma (876 people) and Wuxi (740 people) has exceeded the number of "broken 3" in 2018 (720 people).
By 2019, China has 13 international gold label events, of which 12 are full (including Hong Kong) and 1 half (Yangzhou), ranking first in the world. In addition, the 2022 International Half Marathon Championships will be held in Yangzhou.
Therefore, now china's marathon can be said to be in a favorable situation at the right time, place and people, and what we need to do is to move in the right direction.
About the Author:
Chen Guoqiang, male, is an associate professor at Shanghai University of Sport, a master supervisor, and a doctor of journalism and communication.
Visiting Scholar, School of Public Health, Indiana University,USA (2013-2014)
Column Editor-in-Chief: Chen Hua Text Editor: Chen Hua Title Image Source: Hakone Relay Official Website