Our hometown marathon

It is the most hospitable marathon in Taiwan, with the most typical Taiwanese village characteristics – a marathon in Rice Heaven.

The township motivates 6000 villagers to demonstrate the friendliness and enthusiasm of Tianzhong, all helping to cheer the runners along the way. We invite runners from all across the country to support Taiwan’s smart farming with their legs. With each step they will experience the fragrance of paddy fields and rice, and our hometown compassion.

Tianzhong townships’ volunteers use their absolute joy in cherishing the land to create a friendly, enthusiastic race. This is what makes the Taiwan’s Rice Heaven Tianzhong Marathon world-renowned and beloved by local and overseas runners. It is rated as one of the top three classic races in Taiwan. The Tianzhong Marathon won first prize at the Taiwan Brand International and became “the” marathon event in Taiwan for both local and overseas runners.

The Tianzhong Marathon made something out of nothing. We started with 100 volunteers and today 6000 villagers are contributing their efforts. The first race had around 4000 runners but the 15,000 registrations now available are snapped up within seconds.

This has brought about local business opportunities and an upsurge of youth returning to their hometown. Tourism trends such as bicycle mini-tours, farming experiences, group sports training, and international experience tours were developed. This led to the people of Tianzhong finding confidence and pride. Tianzhong, once just a small town, has now turned into the hometown of thousands of runners every year.

In this year’s event there are 42k, 21k, and 10k categories. In response to the Covid epidemic an online version of the race will be available so that those who cannot be with us can still participate.

Runners can find souvenirs of the event from among Tianzhong’s local specialties. The medals and trophies are designed in the shape of rice grains, demonstrating the characteristics of Taiwan Rice Tianzhong and Golden Rice Waves.

Sustainability is very important in Tianzhong and in the light of this all clothing is made with S.Café® technology. This is an environmentally friendly material, using the remains of coffee grounds as the raw material of the yarn, and is created through a patented process of low temperature and high pressure.

Road running is not limited to the Tianzhong Marathon in November. Come to visit or walk in Tianzhong on any day of the year. In 2018 Tianzhong HSR Sports Hot-zone was established to help runners in their preparation and wellbeing (join on Facebook – Tianzhong HSR Sports Hot-zone). Every week of every season before the Tianzhong Marathon different running and training classes are offered, inviting fellow runners from everywhere to run together.

There are some other competitions and classes that are available throughout the year including the Tianzhong Night-run, the Road-Run Instructional Class, the Love to Run Class, a Sports seminar series. the Official Marathon Training Camp, the Family run summer camp and the Family mini-marathon.