At the women's marathon held at the Tokyo Olympics and Sapporo, Mao Ichiyama was the highest in 8th place in Japan, and he did not win the medal for the first time since Mizuki Noguchi of the 2004 Athens Olympics.

Regarding the women's marathon of the Tokyo Olympics, the Japanese national team players have changed until just before the actual performance, such as the relocation of the venue from Tokyo to Sapporo, the postponement of one year by Corona, and the advancement of the start time notified the night before the race. It became a form to be at the mercy of the change next to.

It was a sudden announcement the night before the race.


It was announced that the start time would be one hour ahead of schedule from 7:00 am to 6:00 am.


The reason is "consideration for athletes' health due to rising temperature".

In Sapporo, the midsummer day of over 30 degrees continued for 17 days until the day before the Olympics, and some athletes abstained from the racewalking race held on the 6th.



These sudden announcements were made two years ago.

On October 16, 2019, the IOC (= International Olympic Committee) announced that it was considering changing the venue for marathons and racewalking to Sapporo because of the "heat of Tokyo."

Chairman Bach explained that he started considering "athlete first" as the top priority.

The background was the World Championships in Athletics held in Qatar in the Middle East just before, where marathons and racewalking were held in harsh conditions where the temperature exceeded 30 degrees Celsius and the humidity exceeded 70%. Players appear one after another.

In the women's marathon, 40% of the participating athletes abstained, and criticism was raised from the athletes and the media.

Having witnessed the fear of "heat", the IOC took the lead in changing the venue, and eventually decided to change the venue to Sapporo.


At this time, a player who had already been appointed as the Japanese national team for the marathon said, "I wanted to reach the national stadium where a large number of spectators welcomed me," and the question "What is athlete first?" I did.



And even in the actual marathon, the sudden announcement confused the players.


The players were contacted around 7 o'clock the night before.

It is undeniable that too sudden changes have caused considerable confusion for the athletes who have prepared their lives by adjusting the rhythm of their lives to the actual race and calculating their sleep time.

Kenya's Peres Jepchirchill, who won the gold medal, said, "It's hot around 9am, but if you start at 6am, it will end after 8am, so it will be a lot easier. When I heard the time change, I thought I did it." I also saw sudden changes as a plus, but there were cases in which some overseas players went to bed before the announcement came, so the coach noticed that he woke up in the morning and then informed him.


Molly Seidel, a bronze medal player from the United States, said, "I heard the time change while eating with my coach, I thought it was a lie, and immediately went to bed," said the surprise at that time.


A Japanese track and field official also said that he should have decided earlier for the athletes, saying, "It's easy to deal with an hour late, but it's hard to get an hour early."

Honami Maeda, who said that he was about to go to bed, admitted that his physical condition was affected, saying, "I didn't change my feelings, but I had no sleep at all."



I have to point out the inadequate outlook of the management side regarding changes that confuse athletes.

It made me think again about what "athlete first" is.