You know that trope about the kid who raises his hand at the end of class to remind the teacher that he forgot to assign any homework? Shamefully, I actually did that once. According to a translation of Japanese news stories by Brett Larner, 262 out of the 263 third through sixth-graders that started a 3K ran only 1800 meters, while the last place finisher ran the correct course and was declared the winner. The wrong-way majority did so because they were following the lead bike.

The event, the Bayfarm Kasaoka Road Race, put out a release in Japanese apologizing for the mistake. According to Google Translate, it reads in part:

"Regarding the section of elementary school 3rd to 6th graders, the competition that everyone was looking forward to, due to incompetence of the organizer, guidance mistakes occurred, very much troubling each participant. I sincerely apologize from my heart. Please acknowledge that it will be a reference record for the time of the day. In addition, one of the 263 participants who completed a regular course finished the race. So I decided to make that person the winner as an official record based on convention rules. As we did so please understand as well."

The original reports had the 262 wrong-way kids DQ'd, but the full release makes it seem like the top finishers from the 1.8K will be rewarded as well. And deservingly so.