Why Japanese young runners are so fast and what we can learn from them.

Do you know the Japanese university students are the best in the world?

In Japan, university students are 18 to 22 years old if they didn’t fail the entrance examination or in a very special situation.

This surprises me from two points of view.

One is, Japanese university students are better than same age of young Kenyan and Ethiopian athletes.

And second, nevertheless top Japanese athletes cannot beat top Kenyan athletes and Ethiopian athletes so far.

Anyway, do you know how many runners ran half marathon under 64 minutes in your whole country?

In only Japanese university students in 2025 (not historically but only in one year in 2025), 355 runners ran half marathon 64 minutes.

Meaning, they ran through a half marathon at approximately 3:00/km pace. And 40 runners ran under 1:01:35, meaning they ran half marathon at under 2:55/km pace.

Today, I want to tell you why Japanese young athletes are so strong and what you can learn from them.

First of all, I want to explain the background, namely the culture and educational system.

In Japan, doing sport as a member of a school is a part of education. And in the school system, very often runners train in a military style. Nowadays, society is changing and it’s getting more and more laid back style.

But still, almost all strong teams have a military style more or less.

In the track and field, usually they start running at the age of 12 years old, twice a day from Monday to Friday and once a day on Saturday. Of course, it depends on a team, but this is typical.

Strong high school teams have the most military style in any category. If a team wants to be top 8 at the Japanese high school Ekiden (road relay, 7 runners run 42.195km totally, each session is 3-10km) championship, they need to live in a dormitory and dedicate everything for long distance running.

Through this system, students learn to work hard, have discipline, team spirits, manner etc. From my point of view, the biggest difference in Japan and other Western country is that Japanese teachers want students to learn how to act as a team through sports and Western teachers want students to be independent through sports.

In other words, Japanese teachers want students learn how to delete personality and act as a team member and Western teachers want students learn how to think and act by themselves and use freedom properly.

This is the biggest difference.

So, in most strong teams in Japan, there is no freedom. They train very seriously almost everyday. As a result, about 700 high school runners run 5000m under 15 minutes every year.

In Japan, 3 years in a strong high school is one of the toughest time in the life. When the vice president of my company (he was my teammate in our high school days) and I were high school students, we called the normal society the outside world. Which means, of course, we were like in a jail.

I also visited Iten in Kenya. Iten is a mecca of long distance running. Many world top athletes come from Iten and/or train in Iten.

But the atmosphere is very different. Kenyan athletes are so cheerful, happy and lively.

But in Japanese strong teams, the atmosphere is so tense like a war field. There was no way to run away from athletics, training, race etc. And in our high school days, there was still physical punishment.

Now, Japanese society changes and there is no physical punishment anymore, but only in my company.

Anyway, the way of thinking to sports for children is very different. For Japanese, sports for children are education and not for fun.

So, by the time they become university students, they are already at a very high level because they are forced to train very seriously.

And the second difference is of course history and culture.

In Japan, baseball is definitely the most popular sport and soccer (football) is the second most popular sport.

The third one is, difficult to say. But most boys who are not good at sports but want to be good at sports come into long distance running because long distance running requires not many techniques but more gut. Actually, I’m one of them and we are not shame about it because at least we have gut and much better than doing no sport.

Girls don’t like weak boys, right?

Anyway, Ekiden and marathon are probably the third popular sport in Japan and those have 100 years history.

100 years ago, there were only baseball, Ekiden, Marathon and martial arts like Judo, Sumo etc. So, Japanese people like and love Marathon and Ekiden and there are many coaches and teachers who wanted to be a coach in Ekiden and Marathon.

Honestly speaking, my great grandfather also ran an Ekiden race. 23 runners relayed 516 km (from Tokyo to Kyoto). But unfortunately, there is no clear record. We have only a very unclear black and white picture of him. Nobody in our family knows how fast he was and of course, at that time there was no professional runner.

But anyway, Japan invented Ekiden before the USA invented atomic bomb and Singapore and Malaysia got independent from the UK. If I write this way, you guys might understand how deep Japanese people are connected with Ekiden and Marathon.

Especially, the Hakone Ekiden. The Hakone Ekiden is a gigantic sport event in Japan and everybody knows the Hakone Ekiden in Japan. If you live in Japan and don’t know the Hakone EKiden, you were probably abducted by the North Korea in the last 50 years.

The Hakone Ekiden started 102 years ago and if you run the Hakone Ekiden, you are a hero of your hometown and your family.

And if you create a good result at the Hakone Ekiden, you are going to get hired by the top company like Toyota, Hoda, Nissan, Mitsubishi etc. Meaning, you can keep running and earn good money.

That’s why a lot of foreigners say or write that there are approximately 500 professional runners in Japan. But it’s half right and half wrong because they are office workers officially. Or I would say ‘Blue color’.

So again, they are like soldiers even though they have more relaxed style than high school students. They earn clearly more than average workers because they work for top companies in Japan but way less than top professional baseball players and us of my company warriors.

In terms of the number of professional runners, it’s the same as in other countries. Most developed countries have a few professional runners, right?

From this point of view, there are much more professional runners in Kenya and Ethiopia.

But anyway, in Japan if you are good at running, you’ll get honor and a very solid job. Also, based on Japanese culture, people love to be stable sooooo much. Working for big companies or the government is the best job for typical Japanese people.

Rich men attract sexy and beautiful women. This equation is always same in any countries in this planet, no matter if it is in Germany, Kenya, Malaysia, Singapore or in Japan.

However, Japanese women love men who have a stable job more than in any other countries as far as I know. Even though I am rich, since my job is unstable, only women who have gut love me.

These factors are very important because men usually work hard and even could die for honor and women and if you get nothing from long distance running, it’s impossible that many people train as serious as we do now. At the end of the day, how strong a country is depends on the culture. Culture is a much bigger factor than a physical factor.

Meaning, there is almost no difference between Japanese people and other people genetically speaking. If you guys get as much honor and good jobs (good stable salary) as Japanese runners do, your country becomes one of the best long distance running country although it takes at least 50 years. It takes at least 50 years that one new culture roots firmly.

Other than culture, race distance is very important. What I mean is, 3000m is the longest distance for junior high school students, 5000m in a track race and 10km in an Ekiden race is the longest distance for high school students and approximately half marathon is the longest distance for university students and full marathon is the longest distance for semi-professional runners.

Meaning, they focus on running fast in a short distance and then try to extend the distance with the same pace later. This makes sense to me because for human beings, extending the distance is easier than running fast.

Once you are able to run 3000m under 9 minutes, it’s not difficult to run full marathon around 2:20. While almost no amateur runner runs 3000m under 9 minutes even though many amateur runners run full marathon under 3 hours.

In the beginning of your running career, you better focus on more intensity and then increase the volume with the same intensity or slightly slower pace. This is easier way.

That means, junior high school students train like a sprinter?

Absolutely no!!

Strong junior high school students train 11 times a week and even if one session is only 6km, it’s already 66km a week. If they run a little bit more, it becomes 70km, 80km, 90km, even 100km a week easily.

6km is definitely not long for all of you readers. But they focus on more intensity and frequency, instead of running long and slow in one running session.

In strong high schools, most of them train 100-140km a week. They usually train around 12 times a week. Even if one running session is only 10km, 120km a week and they can focus on intensity because one running session is not so long and also they train as a team.

In strong universities, they train approximately 140km a week, 600km a month consistently and often 200-250km a week in the Summer vacation. Again, as a team.

And also, although the longest distance for junior high school students is 3000m and the longest distance for high school students is 10km, it doesn't mean that they focus on only 3000m and 10km. Some of them focus on 1500m in a track season and then they focus on longer distance in an Ekiden season.

It’s interesting that many good marathoners come from middle distance world. I have a male friend who ran marathon 2:06 and he focused on 800m and 1500m in his high school days. I also have a female friend who ran 2:18:59 and she focused on 800m and 1500m in her high school days too.

Also, when I became a professional runner, 3 runners in our management came from middle distance world, they ran 2:08-2:06 before carbon shoes were invented.

I don’t think that you should focus on 1500m, but it’s clear that you need to focus on shorter distances in a part of the year.

For example, in Japan many marathon races are held from November to March. So, I often recommend runners focus on shorter distances from 3km to 10km from April to October and then go for half marathon or full marathon.

Also, you need to understand that increasing the total running volume and focusing on long runs is a completely different story. The easiest way of increasing the total running volume is increasing the frequency of running and the average distance of one running session. If you do this before you go for long runs, you can create a solid base for faster half marathon and full marathon.

So, let me summarize what you can learn from good young Japanese runners.

First, burn your desire strongly. You cannot change the culture of your country alone. But you can change your mind by yourself. Simply, as long as your desire is burning, which culture you are belong to doesn’t matter. Burn your desire strongly, have a high standard and high goal.

Second, at least a half of the year, focus on shorter distances from 3km to 10km or focus on shorter distances in the first 3-5 years of your running career and then move to half marathon or full marathon. Because of the culture, the latter way is difficult for Japanese people. Because marathon is so popular and even if you run 10km under 35 minutes, people do not understand how great it is and they don’t praise you, that means you cannot get honor.

So, I usually recommend amateur runners focus on shorter distance in the half of the year. Meaning, focusing on increasing the total distance of running, its average pace and getting used to much faster pace than marathon race pace.

However, some of my Malaysian and Singaporean customers told me that the situation in Singapore and Malaysia is not so radical. Many runners focus on shorter distances and if they run fast in shorter distances, they can get honor. In this case, it’s easier to focus on shorter distances in the first 3-5 years.

Also, the funny thing is that often athletes are told that the first marathon would be the fastest marathon. I don’t know why they are told like that. But yeah, many runners’ first marathon is the fastest and in my case, the second marathon is the fastest so far.

I don’t think that your first marathon would be the fastest. But I can say this clearly, the reason why Japanese young runners are very good at half marathon and full marathon is, they built the solid base for 6 years before they go for half marathon and building the solid base for 10 years before they go for full marathon.

So again, burn your desire strongly, focus on shorter distances in a part of the year or in the first 3-5 years of your career as a runner.

Lastly, if you want to learn more about long distance running, please click here to download my free E-book ‘Three things you should know to get faster dramatically without any injuries and overtraining’.