LIHUE — Kaleo Carvalho of the Mayor’s Office said on Friday that he bought a cape and mask especially for The Kauai Marathon.
“We’re running an aid station,” Carvalho said. “Super heroes! We’re all superheroes at the start of the Tree Tunnel.”
Carvalho shared the Kauai Marathon volunteer shirts with three visitors from Iwaki City, Japan, who arrived on Friday to participate in The Kauai Marathon.
“We have a reception tonight,” said Art Umezu, who helped translate and guide the visitors. “We pick up the race packets on Saturday morning, early, tour the marathon route so the runners get familiar, and Sunday, it’s the marathon before they leave on Monday. When are we going to have time to shop? They have people waiting for Kauai omiyage.”
Toa Oda, a student at Higashi Nihon Ingernational University in Iwaki City, earned a participating spot in The Kauai Marathon by finishing second at the Iwaki Sunshine Marathon 2025 on a run that stopped the clock at 2 hours, 24 minutes, and 34 seconds.
The pair of runners is accompanied by Ryuji Sato of the Iwaki City Office’s Sports and Cultural Exchange Division.
“They don’t have half marathons in Japan,” Umezu said. “Only full marathons. Mr. Oda came because the first-place male finisher got injured about three weeks ago. Mr. Oda was the second-place finisher, just about a minute behind the first-place finisher.”
Ms. Kana Numata, an employee at Hitachi, Ltd. from Tokaimura, Ibaraki Prefecture, is the first-place women’s finisher in the Iwaki Sunshine Marathon and earned her spot in The Kauai Marathon as part of a Sister City arrangement. She blazed the Iwaki Marathon in 2:44.25.
“She’s planning on running for a stretch and then resting,” Umezu said. “The Iwaki Marathon was in February, and it’s now the end of summer.”
During the 2024 Kauai Marathon, the two Japanese runners — Saki Shimada of Tsurumi-ku, Hokkaido, and Seiya Waragai of Tsurumi-ku, Yokohama — finished 1-2. Shimada set the pace at 3:05:52 with Waragai, the first female finisher, following about six minutes off the pace.
The third-place finisher, Justin Deforge of Kapaa, crossed the line at 3:20:16, the first of three Kauai runners in the Top 10.
The Kauai Marathon starts at 6 a.m. on Poipu Road at the entrance to the Poipu Shopping Village.
For more information, visit www.thekauaimarathon.com
Source: The Garden Island
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