japan running news

With regard to the inaugural running of the Mie Matsuzaka Marathon scheduled for Dec. 20 this year, after careful examination of the situation surrounding the ongoing coronavirus crisis we have come to the conclusion that it would be difficult to ensure the health and safety of everyone involved with the race. As such, we regret to announce that the first running will be postponed to Dec. 19, 2021. Although the coronavirus crisis has subsided somewhat on a national level, there are still concerns about a second and third wave of infections, and there is still a need to develop and adapt to a new social lifestyle and to continuously employ infection control measures. It is uncertain what the future holds, and in that regard it is not possible to completely eliminate the risk of infection, which makes a safe and secure event impossible. Additionally, going ahead with planning the race amid these circumstances would place many of our sponsors and event partners in a difficult situ...

On the last business day of May four of the remaining fall Japanese marathons made announcements about their events' futures in the face of coronavirus crisis. The Oct. 4 Tohoku Miyagi Fukko Marathon , 7.457 finishers in its second edition two years ago and canceled last year due to a typhoon, announced the cancelation of this year's race. In their announcement the organizers said that while they did not want to cancel for the second year in a row, they felt that the options available to them for going ahead with the race would deviate too far from the race's mission of building contact between runners and local residents still rebuilding from the 2011 tsunami. All entry fees will be refunded. Held in the only prefecture in Japan not to have found a single case of coronavirus infection to date,  the Oct. 25 Iwate Morioka Marathon , 5,729 finishers last year announced that it is stepping back from its plans to go ahead as scheduled. Race organizers said that they would ...