The “31 Legged Race”, TV Asahi’s popular format, has been licensed for the 8th series in Thailand and 2nd series in Vietnam.

「Thai Championship」
On January 26th 2013, the 8th Championship was held at Hua Mark National Stadium in Bangkok. The entire event from the preliminaries to the final has been documented and will be aired on Thai’s “Channel 9” on February 25th, 2013. The Championship is in its 8th year, and more than 300 schools have participated in the event this year making the total number of participating school children more than 10,000 over the past 8 years. It has become a major event in which children from all over Thailand take part. On the final day of the championship, the 30 best schools from around the country gathered at the venue from early in the morning, and the stadium was packed with their parents and classmates cheering their teams. All of the 30 finalist team representing 30 schools completed their 50m run without tripping and the best time was 8.96 seconds. The Resaupatum School won the championship.

「Vietnam Championship」
Vietnam will hold its 2nd championship this year. The 1st championship was held in Ho Chi Minh City alone, but this year the scale of the event has grown substantially and preliminary rounds will be held in Hanoi as well as in Ho Chi Minh City with the total number of participating schools amounting to 100. Only the best 5 schools from each preliminary are eligible for the final, and the 10 finalist teams representing the 10 schools will come together on April 14th at the Phu Tho Stadium in Ho Chi Minh City for the finals. The coverage of the entire event from the preliminaries to the final is scheduled to be aired in three parts on “VTV3”, Vietnam’s terrestrial channel, on April 13th, 20th and 27th from 10am to 11am.
The year 2013 is designated as the “Vietnam-Japan Friendship Year” commemorating the 40th anniversary of the establishment of diplomatic relations between Vietnam and Japan, and this event has been highly evaluated as an event that will become a bridge of friendship between Japan and Vietnam. The event has been formally recognized as one of the “Friendship Year Commemorative Events”. Mr. Yoshioka at the Japanese Embassy in Vietnam commented, “I hope that it will become a great event which will give a boost to this memorial year of friendship between Vietnam and Japan”.

「Prospect of sales in other Asian Markets」
The format of “31 Legged Race” has been successfully sold in three Asian countries; China, Thailand and Vietnam. The format has also become a successful collaboration project with Japanese companies that are expanding their business overseas: the 31 Legged Race in Guangzhou, China, being sponsored by Canon; the 31 legged Race in Thailand being sponsored by Honda, and the 31 Legged Race in Vietnam sponsored by Lotte.
TV Asahi plans to distribute the format of “31 Legged Race” in Asia aggressively to make the championship even more popular so as to realize the 31 Legged Race Asian Championship in the future.

「What is the “31 Legged Race”?」
30 elementary school children form a team by connecting their legs by ankle straps and they must run together for 50 meters. It was originally aired as one of the challenge segments of “Challengers on Fire”, a TV Asahi variety show boasting super high audience ratings. The segment started as a spin-off, an annual special program covering the national championship held every year for 14 years from 1996 to 2009. The championship had truly become a national event for which a huge number of children in Japan strived, and children from around the country participated to win the national title. The championship was highly acclaimed as a major event for all elementary schools in Japan to take part in for the fun and to develop a friendly team spirit for the children.