The Mizuno Sport Foundation together with the Japan Sport Association and the Japan Olympic Committee honored the great sower of the march in Japan.
Yesterday April 23 in a solemn ceremony in Tokyo, Fumio Imamura was awarded for his contribution to the development of race walking in the Country of the rising sun with the victory of the bronze in Rio de Janeiro, but also with the successes in individual and team World Championships.
Fumio Imamura has always been with a smile even when he was spending moments in which sporting successes were slow to arrive. But he was confident that his job would pay off sooner or later.
And so it was.
If today Japan has become the strong battleship at the level of male race walk capable at times of obscuring the successes of China it is due in particular to him.
The teachings received in the past by Jerzy Hausleber before and by Sandro Damilano were then put into practice with humility and made the most of the experience gained in a life spent on race walk in Countries with solid history such as Mexico and Italy.
The writer has a personal friendship with him, a friendship of those solid and based on mutual respect: a single moment of confrontation that we allow ourselves to remember with an anecdote dating back as far back as October 2005 when at a dinner in Carrù in Piedmont, Italy we disagreed about the quality of the meat. In essence, he was inclined to highlight the Kobe Beef, while the writer appreciated the 13 courses of "boiled beef of Carrù".
Thank you, friend, for what you did for race walking not only of your Country, of which you can be proud, but also worldwide.
We hope to meet soon.
Koji Hoga Miura, Fumio Imamura, Shigeyuki Shimizu a successful team