This year Asics is once again sponsoring the World Ekiden, scheduled for Nov. 22 and open to the public for enrollment since Oct. 4. Just as the marathon symbolizes a herald’s run to Athens thousands of years ago to deliver news of a battle, the Ekiden symbolizes the relay that messengers once effected between the old and new capitals of Japan, Kyoto and Tokyo. The race dates back about a century, and its name means something like “stagecoach.” Teams may have as many as six runners for its six variable stages: three of 5,000 meters, two of 10,000 meters and one of 7,200 meters. The race is run virtually, from anywhere on earth. Instead of a baton, runners pass to one another at the end of their leg a digital version of the tasuki, the Ekiden’s traditional fabric band.
Last year’s Ekiden drew more than 56,000 runners from 179 countries. This year, the participants will be raising funds for organizations in the field of mental health, notably the foundation Progetto Itaca. Not coincidentally, for World Mental Health Day, on Oct. 10, Asics and the charity Mind set up an outdoor gym on the streets of Retford, an English town in Nottinghamshire, with the aim of lifting the town’s spirits. The experiment apparently resulted in an improvement of 27 percent. In similar fashion, runners in this year’s Ekiden will be scanning their faces before and after the race with Mind’s Uplifter app. The data will go into a World Uplift Score, and tracked live on a World Uplift Map.
