Stockholm, 1912

At 35° C it was an unusually hot day for Stockholm. Shizo Kanakuri stood at the start line of the marathon in the 1912 Stockholm Olympics. Shizo was carrying the hopes, dreams, and pride of Japan, a country attempting to become a “modern” nation.

There was something that made him stand out from the rest of the runners though.

He was the only one not wearing shoes.

Shizo ran the race in a “tabi”.

A tabi (足袋) is a “toed” fabric shoe/sock that has been worn in Japan (and parts of Asia) for thousands of years. Most commonly, tabis are made of cotton.

In 1912 shoes were still not very popular in Japan. Most of the populace worked barefoot, wore straw sandals, or wore tabis made of cloth.

Shizo was one of the first people to run a marathon in Japan in a cotton tabi and quickly discovered they fell apart after the grueling beating they took in 42 km of running.

He worked with a tabi store owner near his school to improve the design and many attempts later, he had a tabi that lasted the entirety of the race. Alas, this would prove no good in Stockholm, where unlike Japan, the roads he ran on were cobbled.

His tabi were torn to shreds. Overheated and exhausted, he was helped by a local family who gave him juice, buns, and a place to rest. Ashamed, he quietly returned to Japan without notifying race officials.

Although Shizo did not win the Olympics, he is considered the father of Japanese marathon running and his experiments with the tabi led to the success of many Japanese runners in later years and helped jumpstart Japan’s sports shoe industry.

A brief history of the tabi

The history of the tabi is complicated, but most people seem to agree that it started life is a simple piece of leather called a “tanpi” (単皮) wrapped around the foot. It is unclear at what point this simple piece of leather developed a split for the big toe, but it is believed the split toe allowed soldiers to control their movements precisely and was advantageous in battle.

Leather tabis trundled along till 1657, when the Great fire of Meireki burned 60-70% of Tokyo to the ground. After the fire, people started buying leather for its fire protection properties, l