Japan sent only two athletes to the 1912 Olympics in Stockholm, and one of them was marathon runner Shiso (often spelled Shizo) Kanakuri. The trip took ten days by train, and race day was brutally hot. Partway through the marathon he collapsed and was taken in by a local family, and rather than face officials and admit he had failed, he went home without telling anyone. In Sweden he was officially listed as missing for more than 50 years. In 1967, Swedish television tracked him down in Japan and asked whether he would like to finish his race. At 75 he went back to Stockholm and crossed the finish line with an official time of 54 years, 246 days, and change. “It was a long trip,” he said. “Along the way I got married, had six children and 10 grandchildren.”
