The Tokyo Marathon 2016, a fixture that colors the capital’s spring, was held Sunday, February 28, and many runners raced past Palaceside Building in good form (photo above is Takebashi Crossing in front of the west entrance).
The high reached 15 degrees — past warm, a hot day — and 37,000 athletes, Japan’s largest marathon field, took on the full marathon, the 10-kilometer race and the wheelchair marathon.
Seven years ago, talent Kunihiro Matsumura, running for a TV program, briefly went into cardiac arrest and made news. Curious, I looked up past incidents: at the Tokyo Marathon, Matsumura and one other man went into cardiac arrest in 2009, both were revived, and through this tenth edition there have been no other accidents — that is, not one death.
In Japan more than 1,400 marathons are held each year on average, and from 1989 to 2012 a total of 154 people died of cardiac arrest.
Why almost no accidents at the Tokyo Marathon? Because the medical setup is solid. According to Nihon Kohden, the maker that supplies (lends) AEDs to the race, aid stations are set every few kilometers with doctors and nurses waiting; AEDs are placed at some thirty-odd spots including those stations; and pairs of volunteers on bicycles carry AEDs and run alongside. All mobile staff are tracked by GPS, so if something happens they can go to the rescue.
In cardiac arrest, the chance of survival is said to drop 7–10 percent for every minute aid is delayed, so this fine-grained response is what makes it safe.
A friend at Kokushikan University says the school organizes a roadside aid team for the race. The team is mainly students of the Faculty of Physical Education’s Department of Sport and Medical Science, graduates of that department and the graduate school, and faculty; people with emergency medical technician qualifications carry AEDs on their backs and patrol the course by bicycle (photo at right, from the university site), supporting a safe run. The “AED team” that saved Matsumura and the other man in 2009 is said to be this one.