Why don't more American race in Japan?

Its not just Japan , its americans do not race enough around the world.

Poor coaching and understanding international competition.

Lack of a master plan to develop an athlete long term with international exposure.

Poor agent not knowing how to get athlete into international competitions.

So is this why Meb doesn't race in Japan or much around the world?

Money. The top Americans are paid handsomely to race in the US and the appearance fees they command overseas are not worth it. I'm sure if more Americans signed with Japanese shoe companies they would get bonuses for racing internationally, but Nike is not going to pay their US athletes to go race in Japan or Europe unless they have a chance of winning. Might as well send their Africans.

How excited would you be if some Japanese guys came over to race here? Unless they were winning races, I would guess not at all. Same deal over in Japan; they wouldn't care about Americans unless they were winning and the reality is very few non-Africans are beating the Africans (of which there are a fair number in Japan). No interest, no money.

Plus, Japan is really far away. Tokyo is 10 times zones away from New York, so the jet lag is going to be pretty bad. In a sport where wins and losses rely almost entirely on fitness, a disadvantage like that is huge. It's not as bad for those on the west coast, which I guess is where most professional American runners live, but still not ideal.

Lastly, from a competitive standpoint it's not like the best guys in the world are from Japan. Yes the scene there is good and competitive, but it is not the pinnacle of competition. They don't even host a diamond league meet, or any track meet of internation consequence from what I can tell. Japan is more focused on the raods, but today roads means the marathon. Fukuoka and Tokyo are good and all, but they are not one of the majors. They are on par with most of the other "B" level marathons, which consist mainly of all the European ones save Berlin and London plus a few other ones like Dubai and the two Japanese ones.

A) Expensive

B) Radioactive

C) Japanese are racists

Because it wouldn't benefit US based sponsors.

might be wejo wrote:

Fukuoka and Tokyo are good and all, but they are not one of the majors.

Actually Tokyo is one of the majors.

A few good reasons have already been given, but another is that the Japanese races have very limited places and budget available for non-Japanese athletes and that there are few Americans good enough to justify taking them over better athletes from other countries. If you're going to take four people from overseas like in the race you posted above why would you take a 62-minute American when you could get a random 27:06 Eritrean to debut? The handful of Americans faster than 62 or with a track time near 27:06 would probably be way more expensive.

Fuk & Tok are majors

Japan has an ancient society and culture which is very similar to Kenya and Ethiopoia thus Kenyans and Ethiopians very easily adapt to Japanese ways.

cause its crazy far away!! you try racing after travelling for that long

yikesman wrote:

cause its crazy far away!! you try racing after travelling for that long

Kenyans and Ethiopians do it all the time. Jetlag is overrated.

obviously the reason is Japanese drug testers will not provide coaches aprior information on test sampling that technicians require to avoid detection.

Wimps wrote:

Its not just Japan , its americans do not race enough around the world.

Poor coaching and understanding international competition.

Lack of a master plan to develop an athlete long term with international exposure.

Poor agent not knowing how to get athlete into international competitions.

None of these four sentences are sentences.

You knew already, but......... wrote:

obviously the reason is Japanese drug testers will not provide coaches aprior information on test sampling that technicians require to avoid detection.

No one gets the heads up these days. No one's getting help from USADA or WADA. There are corrupt federations still in the works, but they're relics. Christian Cantwell got tested while at the hospital the day his son was born, while at a casino and while he was gone fishing. Does that really sound like cooperative work?

I know it's fun to think, "my head's not in the sand...I know how it is in the real world...I'm no pollyanna..." but take a step back from the joys of cynicism and consider the possibility that there is no massive conspiracy between reliable testing agencies, the federations of free nations and athletes and that no athlete is safe.

Fuk & Tok are majors wrote:

Fuk & Tok are majors

Tokyo is a major, Fukuoka is not. I hear this sort of thing all the time on here, "do you think x marathon is good enough to be called a major?" and other shit like that. Do you guys realize that the World Marathon Majors refers to a specific list of 6 races? "Major" is not a term you can just throw around and debate about. Tokyo, Boston, London, Berlin, Chicago, NYC. That's it.

Fukuoka and Tokyo have beem major marathons for decades already. The league you mention is a misnomer. Hope this helps.

Do you running fans really not know about this?

"Major" is short for one of the races in the World Marathon Majors series. I had thought that Tokyo was replacing New York for this time only, but it seems that as of two months ago Tokyo is formally a permenent part of the series. I stand corrected. Fukuoka is not part of the series.

Fukuoka is a good race with a lot of history, but the depth of the field is not as good as the WMM races.