Hi! I wasn’t able to watch the marathon but I was interested in the results I saw on the news. I know that some athletes with national reputations (notably, Yuki Kawauchi) participated in the 30 kilometer event but I was interested to see that both the male and female winners of the full marathon were local folks: Hiroaki Furukawa (古川大晃, a student a Kumadai, who won for the second year in a row) and Seika Iwamura (岩村聖華, of Hikawa). I haven’t heard anything about participation in the full marathon being restricted to local people so I’m impressed at how well hometown athletes have done.
– Kirk
