With the Fukuoka International Marathon returning Sunday under new management we wanted to revisit the documentary JRN produced last year, Inside the Outside - When the World Came to Fukuoka, looking back at its 75-year history as it came to end. We talked to 75 international athletes who ran Fukuoka over the decades, including dozens of legends of the sport -- all but one of the world record holders to have run Fukuoka, all but one of the Olympic medalists to have run it, all but two of the living non-Japanese winners, and many more -- about their memories of the race and thoughts about it ending. Two of the participants, Luiz Antonio dos Santos of Brazil and Kenny Moore of the U.S.A., have passed away since recording their parts. We even produced a Japanese-language version too. It was a massive project, but it needed to be done.
Having scored its 3rd-straight Hakone Ekiden win this past January, Aoyama Gakuin University spent the Golden Week spring holidays training on the Myoko Plateau in Niigata from May 2-6. Along with the champion men's ekiden team, the first 2 members of AGU's new women's long distance team Nodoka Ashida and Kairi Ikeno , and AGU alumni and 2026 New Year Ekiden champion GMO team members Yuya Yoshida and Asahi Kuroda also took part in the training camp. Depending on the day's training schedule, mileage at the camp was over 50 km a day. AGU men's captain Kaito Nakamura confidently said, "This Golden Week training camp is where we lay the foundations for our 4th-straight Hakone title." A lot of people spend Golden Week on vacation, but the AGU ekiden team spent their time working hard on Myoko's rolling land amid the sprouting leaves of spring. On the 2nd day of the camp, May 3, team members woke up at 5:00 a.m. to do their warmup. The team assembled a...

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