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Taiwan’s road running development first.
2.4 A brief history of Taiwan’s road running
“Road running” is a modern term. In ancient times, running was included in the
track and field domain; it usually took place on a track, not a road, and was based on
kilometer lengths and named marathon or ultramarathon. Nowadays, road running
includes wider genres, such as jogging, long-distance runs, marathons, half marathons,
ultramarathons, triathlons, and run ups. Distances from 200-meter children’s events to
42.195-kilometer or more than 100-kilometer marathon adult events are available to the
public (朱立心 Chu Li-Hsin, 2013).
Among the sporadic research focusing on Taiwanese marathons and track and field,
雷寅雄Lei Yin-Hsiung’s (1998) Taiwan Track and Field Development is considered a
representative book on early Taiwan track and field. It contains many precise data,
documents, and rare images from 1946 to 1973, authentically recording Taiwan’s early
sports development. According to 雷寅雄 Lei Yin-Hsiung (1998), in 1946, the Taiwan
Province government held the first provincial sports meet(台灣省運動會) on October
25 to celebrate Taiwan Restoration Day(光復節), and such meets were held every year
for thirty years. Restricted by muddy sports fields and capricious weather, the quality
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of early track and field improved slowly. The men’s competitive marathon started in
1947, at the second Taiwan provincial sports meet, and it was only open to the top two
athletes from each city. Women’s competitive marathon late until 1983 officially
included in Taiwan province sports meeting competition events (雷寅雄 Lei
Yin-Hsiung, 1998). Similar to the case in other countries (Hargreaves, 1994), early sports
development in Taiwan extoled the virtues of masculinity and sports elitism.
From the 1940s to the 1970s, running events were controlled by the government.
With a clear diplomatic purpose, sports had more political meaning in constructing
nationalism and ruling legitimacy in early Taiwan sports history.3 In 1955, the
Republic of China Track & Field Committee(中華民國田徑協會)4 was established.
In 1978, under the leadership of Chi Cheng (紀政), the Republic of China Track &
Field Association initially arranged a four-month winter outdoor road running event to
promote a countrywide atmosphere for sports running annually from November until
February. As the number of road running participants gradually increased, in 1982, the
quarterly cross-country events officially became “road running” events; the
3 During the 1960s, the best-known Taiwanese athletes, the “Asian Iron Man,” Yang Chuan-Kuang (楊 傳廣), and “Asia’s Flying Antelope,” Chi Cheng(紀政), both stood out in international sports
competition in the 1960 and 1968 Olympic games (雷寅雄 Lei Yin-Hsiung, 1998).
4 Now Chinese Taipei Track & Field Association
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government opened the whole year to hold road running events, and this paved the way
for local governments to hold road running events individually (邱榮基、畢璐鑾Chiu
Rung-Chi & Bi Lu-Luan, 2005).
In 1986, the Taipei International Marathon became the first marathon named after
a city, standing for Taiwan road running from field to road, from suburb to city. The
milestone embodied a new form of sports tourism that was encoded in the city
marketing strategies to increase the marathon tourism momentum. 許績勝、許光麃、
呂佳莉Hsu Gi-Sheng, Hsu Kuang-Piao, and Lu Chia-Li (2013) examined the route
planning and transitions of the Taipei International Marathon. As the first city-held
marathon in Taiwan, because of the road route length growth (from 10 kilometers5 to
42 kilometers) and urban development conflict6, the city marathon challenged the city
order and was considered the best city-promoting tool. It is a pity that the study was
only based on route planning descriptions instead of conducting a deeper analysis of
the relationship between the Taipei International Marathon and the Taipei City
spectacle or image. In 2004, the Taipei International Marathon became the ING Taipei
International Marathon, sponsored by the ING Capital Life Insurance Company, and
5 From 1981-1985, a 10-kilometer mini-marathon was held every year in Taipei.
6 During the Taipei city metro construction, it was difficult to hold a marathon in the city.
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created many breakthroughs, appealing to great athletes from both inside and outside
Taiwan to take part. It was even recognized by the International Association of Athletics
Federations (IAAF) as an international credentialed event, showing the public and
private sector’s co-partnership. According to 吳 孟 書 Wu Meng-Shu (2010),
corporations could foster their reputation and draw consumer support by holding road
running events. Thus, at this stage, the marathon was combined with tourism and
sponsored by private entrepreneurs, creating a different picture compared with previous
periods. However, 郭豐州 Kuo Feng-Chou (2013) stated that, “around 2008, local road
running clubs started to hold small-scale marathons by themselves, which became a
special characteristic of Taiwanese marathon.” Therefore, not just entrepreneurs but
grassroots power was involved. Extending from the city marathon, more actors have
joined road running since 2011, which I regard as the “marathoneconomic period.” It
was a whole new stage for road running development in Taiwan, characterized by
“interesting,” “genderizing,” and “more youth people involved”.
Nike launched the first female road race in 2011, and it dominated the female road
running market until 2013, when two more female road races were held by Mizuno and
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a female website7. In 2014, Nike, Mizuno, and a non-sports company, the Chungwa
Association for International Exchange of Recreational Sports (中華國際休閒運動交
流協會) initiated three other female road running events. This was the first time that
road running had a gender restriction, which is my focal point in the current study. In
2013, Taiwan introduced the “Color Run” fun run, and within a couple of months, the
fun run started a new fad, leading to a series of themes with diverse titles, such as the
Zombie Fun Run, Hello Kitty Road Run, Red Wine Fun Run, and Run for the Earth.
From then on, road running is not purely a sports but has cosplay elements that people
enjoy, which is “interesting”. The marathoneconomic period does not have apparent
organizers but multiple authorities (蕭涵 Shiou Han, 2014), even the crowd itself (張
家瑋Chang Chia-Wei, 2014).
張烽益Chang Fong-Yi (2015) ultimately concluded that the Taiwan road running
trend that started in 2010 had apparently connecting to Taiwanese youth. In 2005,
runners 40-49 years old accounted for the main percentage, while in 2014, those 30-39
years old were the biggest running group. Youth and adolescents massively joined road
running and changed the original running environment. And the growing number of
7 Baby You, a women’s website devoted to gender topics.
http://www.babyou.com/opencms/?__locale=zh_TW
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road running participants in this period was attributed to government’s promotion and
the arise of social media. The Taiwan Sports Administration promoted sports through
several plans: the “Sunshine Fitting Plan,” the “Sports Population Growth Plan,” and
“Build a Sports Island.” Through the efforts of the government, non-government
organizations, schools, and local groups, Taiwanese people have become more aware
of the importance of leisure sports and participation has gradually increased, but “fun
run,” followed by the rise of the Internet generation, grew fast and became omnipresent
(葉基 Yeh Ji, 2013). Especially with the use of smart phones, message communication
has become instantaneous. 邱仕騰、蕭嘉惠 Chiu Shih-Teng and Shiou Chia-Huei
(2014) took Color Run as an example, showing that fun runs exhibit some differentiated
features from previous road running activities. For example, promotion is done via not
just traditional media but also through social media such as Facebook and Twitter to
spread the message. Fan pages, embedded pictures, retweet, and reposts are all potent
factors that announce the success of the fun run wave. Similarly, 萬年生 Wan
Nien-Sheng(2015) cited the rise of social media as one of the prime reasons that people
replaced photos of restaurant delicacies with pictures in the sweltering gym or outdoors.
It became apparent that road running had a spillover effect. If we analyze the
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popular road running events in Taiwan recently, it becomes clear that most of them were
hosted by sporting goods manufacturers, and almost all of them required high entry
fees, with many limited consumable products and gear. In Taiwan, not just sports related
products but also food, clothing, and smartphone applications have enthusiastically
been combined with sports elements (萬年生 Wan Nien-Sheng, 2015). The first
runner’s restaurant, Rest & Run, which featured meals designed especially for runners
and offered a shower room and cloakroom in Taipei, the popularity of athleisure
clothing, designed for athletic workouts, are all strong evidences of the spillover effect
of road running craze. However, at the end of 2014, Taipei city government first
announced a new regulation for road running: the “Taipei Road Race Events Audit Pilot
Plan” (Taipei City Government, 2014). Road running events with more than 3,000
participants would be categorized into three different sections: A (boulevard-lined
route), B (great scenery and artistic aura route), and C (riverside park and family
playground route) based on the running route and number of participants. This
regulation went into effect in 2015. The frequency of road running events was restricted,
we could take this new regulation as the countermeasure taken by city government in
response to the non-stop road running craze in Taiwan.
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To sum up, the four stages of Taiwan road running development, started from 1946
till now, feature different characteristics and leading by different institutions,
represented diverse social meanings (see Table 1). This study, thus, focused on the
“Marathon economy” period, especially on how media and business co-constructed the
female road running with different means. In the next chapter, based on the literature
review, I would clarify my research questions and describe my methodology in detail,
including how I collected the sampling data, selected interviewees, and my analyzed
dimensions.
Table 1: Four stages of Taiwan road running development (1946- now) Stage Taiwan province
Leader ●Country/city government ●Republic of China Track & Field
Meaning ●Ruling legitimacy
●Nationalism
●Sports for all citizen
●Central government decentralized
●Internationalized
●Private sector involved
●City spectacle, urban
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Chapter Three: Research Questions and Method