Running News Daily

Another look at the 2018 Boston Marathon Champion Yuki Kawauchi

Yuki Kawauchi’s improbable victory at the Boston Marathon on Monday is the crowning glory in the career of an amateur Japanese runner who has defied every convention in modern athletics and taken the road less travelled to make his mark.

The 31-year-old from Saitama, who becomes the first Japanese man to win the Boston Marathon since Toshihiko Seko in 1987, holds down a full-time job working at a local school, and trains without the aid of a coach or sponsorship. And he has competed in more than 80 marathons.

After splashing across the finish line through wind and rain ahead of defending champion Geoffrey Kirui of Kenya on Monday, Kawauchi was in no doubt he surprised a few people.

“I don’t think there was a single person in Boston who thought I would win this today,” he said with a smile. “In the marathon you never know what could happen.”

(Editor’s note: we did think that Yuki was the best runner in the field winning other races in extreme weather conditions. This being posted Sunday on MBR.)

Many of Kawauchi’s marathon wins have come in awful weather and he said being battered by wind and rain in Boston played right into his hands.

“I think the conditions were instrumental in being able to win …” he added. He has won his last five marathons, including four in 2018 alone, and ran 12 last year. Kenya’s reigning Olympic champion Eluid Kipchoge by comparison ran only two.

“I love to run races,” said Kawauchi. “Races gives me the opportunity to travel and in a more practical sense, because I train by myself if I didn’t put in a lot of races I wouldn’t be able to put in the same quality.”