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Watch the New Year Ekiden and Hakone Ekiden Live Online

The biggest three days of racing of the year are also most here, the Jan. 1 New Year Ekiden national men's corporate championships and the Jan. 2-3 Hakone Ekiden university men's race.  Look for full previews for both events later this week along with JRN's year-end reviews.

Overseas viewers should be able to watch both the New Year Ekiden and Hakone Ekiden via Keyhole TV, the New Year Ekiden broadcast beginning Jan. 1 at 8:50 a.m. on TBS and Hakone's broadcast on Nihon TV beginning at 7:00 a.m. on both the 2nd and the 3rd.  Once again, JRN will do live English commentary via Twitter @JRNLive.

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Australian YouTuber Handed Lifetime Ban by Ageo City Half Marathon After Running 1:06 with Another Runner's Bib (updated)

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Nat'l University Ekiden Updates Here

Looks like I just went over my update limit on Twitter - sorry, it's the first time I've tried to use it for this. I'll look for another option next time. In the meantime I'll add updates to the comments below. Not sure if that has a max too but I guess we'll find out. Update: Part one of the Nationals commentary can be found here .

How it Happened

Ancient History I went to Wesleyan University, where the legend of four-time Boston Marathon champ and Wes alum Bill Rodgers hung heavy over the cross-country team. Inspired by Koichi Morishita and Young-Cho Hwang’s duel at the 1992 Barcelona Olympics I ran my first marathon in 1993, qualifying for Boston ’94 where Bill was kind enough to sign a star-struck 20-year-old me’s bib number at the expo. Three years later I moved to Japan for grad school, and through a long string of coincidences I came across a teenaged kid named Yuki Kawauchi down at my neighborhood track. I never imagined he’d become what he is, but right from the start there was just something different about him. After his 2:08:37 breakthrough at the 2011 Tokyo Marathon he called me up and asked me to help him get into races abroad. He’d finished 3rd on the brutal downhill Sixth Stage at the Hakone Ekiden, and given how he’d run the hills in the last 6 km at Tokyo ’11 I thought he’d do well at Boston or New York. “I...