If you look back at the 2023 Chinese marathon in many years, how would you define this year?Together, we are witnessing, experiencing and rewriting history.
The 2023 season is a completely "different" season, with national records broken, international competitions landed, many cities returned from a long absence, and foreign faces returned to China.
98 Run counts the top 100 male and female marathon runners in the 2023 season and their race-day shoes, this original analysis report comparing the past five years, behind the development of China's marathon competition, but also the change of the tide of the times for sports brands. Athletes on the podium are also "running shoes on the podium", and the public discourse system is quietly changing.
The athletes with the highest competitive strength in a sport are the most commercially valuable group and the group that can be favored by sponsors.
This reflects the marketing skills, industry resources, and sponsorship layout of major brands, as well as whether their product performance can support the top level of competitive requirements.
Judging from the data of the top 100 shoes alone, if the situation presented by domestic brands and foreign brands in the past few years is a rivalry, then in 2023, domestic brands have achieved a comprehensive leading trend in the Chinese market.
In the list of the top 100 men's shoes in 2023, domestic brands account for 80%, and foreign investors only have a 20% share. Among the 14 brands on the list, seven of the top 10 are domestic.
After surpassing foreign investment in 2022 to achieve the lead in the men's list, Xtep will continue to win the crown in 2023 and continue to expand its lead with a share of 41%, and has achieved the first place among domestic brands for five consecutive years.
With a share of 20%, Anta made rapid progress and hit a new highNike came in third with 12 percent. Li Ning, Zhongqiao Sports, Hongxing Erke and Peak all achieved growth.
In the list of the top 100 women's in 2023, domestic brands accounted for 64%, surpassing foreign brands for the first time.
Xtep ranked first with a share of 33%, and also surpassed foreign investment for the first time and achieved the first place in the industryNike is in second place on the list with 27%, and Anta has won 15% to enter the top three. Li-Ning is basically the same as in 2022, while Adidas' market share has regressed significantly.
Combined with the overview data in 2023 and compared with the top 100 shoe data in the four years from 2019 to 2022, the advantages of international giants are being reduced year by year.
Taking the men's top 100 as an example, Nike running shoes accounted for 73% of the men's top 100 in 2019, and now only 12% remain. Xtep has jumped from 10% in 2019 to 41% todayAnta went from a clean sheet to a 20% share.
Nike, Adidas and other international first-line brands, their product performance is still undoubted, racing running shoes are still in the "best" list, but specific to the reputation of athlete sponsorship and elite athletes, their advantages in the Chinese market are being eroded by several major giants.
In terms of the top 100 women, Nike has accounted for the first place for four consecutive years, and will be surpassed by Xtep by 2023, and brands such as Anta and Li Ning are also making efforts. Women's sponsorship potential is often lower than that of men, and from this perspective, their "voting with their feet" on race day is more geared towards product performance.
In the past, Zhongqiao Sports, which had a good reputation in terms of cost performance, accounted for 2% of the competition and the continuous involution of performanceThanks to the cooperation with Yunnan, Guizhou and **, ANTA accounted for 15% of the total this year.
Xtep's front-end layout, product performance, and years of deep cultivation continue to reap results, with the proportion of 33% almost doubling compared with 2022.
In the past, we had a deeper perception of Xtep's men's players, and most of the Chinese men's top players were athletes under his command.
In the case that Nike signed Zhang Deshun, Zhang Xinyan, Ding Changqin, Hongxing Erke signed Li Zhixuan, and the women's top players did not have an advantage, Xtep still won 33% this year. Aside from the sponsorship and cooperation factors, Xtep seems to have the recognition of many "tap water" female elite players.
In terms of the best results of the year, Xtep, which has the deepest lineup of athletes, has topped the men's top spot four times in five years.
Yang Shaohui is wearing 160x 30 Pro running shoes set a new national record in the Fukuoka International Marathon in Japan, and in the Wuxi Marathon in March, He Jie and Yang Shaohui broke the national record, and the feet were all Xtep running shoes.
Zhang Deshun Nagoya Women's Marathon ranked first this year with a time of 2:24:05, the best time in the past 11 years, and at her feet was the Nike Vaporfly Next% 2 running shoe.
This shoe is also the same shoe that Zhang Deshun won the silver medal at the Hangzhou Asian Games and the Chinese championship in the Shanghai Marathon. Since Zhang Deshun cooperated with Nike in 2020, his competitive level and public influence have steadily increased year by year.
With the acceleration of the top runners and historical breakthroughs, from the perspective of a larger group, China's marathon is also speeding up in an all-round way.
In the 2023 season, a total of 114 men will run into the 220, which means that 220 is not even guaranteed to be in the top 100. A total of 27 people ran in 2 hours and 13 minutes, several of which were new highs.
Leaving aside the 2022 cut-down events, the 2021 men's 100th place is 2:23:29, the 2020 men's 100th place is 2:23:47, and the 2023 men's 100th place is 2:19:18.
In 2023, a total of 49 runners ran 240 and 22 runners ran 2 hours and 34 minutes. The women's 100th place this year became 2:51:38. The above data also hit a five-year high.
China's marathons are building a deeper pool of talent, whether they are registered professional athletes, non-registered professional runners, or amateur elite runners.
The overall acceleration of the general environment means that if the individual is standing still, it means that he will regress. In the past, the 215 level almost guaranteed a good sponsorship contract, but now the 215 is no longer in the ranks. Athletes need to work harder to "eat this meal", whether it is the competition for prize money or the level of commercial sponsorship contracts.
From the multi-dimensional analysis of the big data of the top 100 men's and women's top 100 players on the competition day, domestic brands are achieving a leap in the Chinese market, and also showing more fierce competition.
As Xtep, which has been deeply involved in the field of road running for 16 years, it still maintains its leading position in the face of more and more "volume" trends. In the 2023 season, the proportion of men continued to expand its advantage, and the proportion of women surpassed foreign investment for the first time and achieved the leading position in the whole industry.
From the perspective of the layout of elite runners, they have helped the Chinese men's marathon record break twice a year, and they have accompanied and supported more middle-waist runners to grow into top runners.
2:07:30 and He Jie is the most typical case, behind the birth of He Jie, is Xtep's years of deep cultivation and long-term layout in the marathon field.
Yoon Soon-Kim finished 27 races in a single season in Xtep running shoes, stabilized his level to 212 and refreshed the PB twiceCen Wanjiang, a grassroots runner from Guizhou, has joined hands with Xtep for the third time this season in the past two years and has reached the international level of athletes, and he has repeatedly beaten foreign runners to win championships in major events.
In Xtep's vast athlete landscape, there are many such examples. Since the release of the 160X Champion Running Shoe, as of the end of this year, the Xtep Champion Edition 160X series has helped 83 Chinese athletes win 370 marathon championships.
From the 98 annual top 100 list to a larger group, this year's "Xiamen, Beijing, Shanghai and Guangzhou" four most influential events in China, Xtep running shoes ranked first in a number of core data in the proportion of breaking three groups and the overall proportion.
This shows that in addition to elite runners, the product power of Xtep running shoes is gaining the recognition of more professional teams, professional runners, and public runners. Xtep has gone from being a "champion's choice" to becoming the first choice for runners.
According to a statistic from 98 Run, the highest "appearance rate" of the top 100 shoes in 2023 is Xtep 160x 30 pro。This August, the new generation of Champion Edition running shoes 160x50 Pro was officially launched, and after this iteration, the shoe has gained a new report card in the proportion of mass elite time periods and elite athletes.
Athlete Dong Guojian wears 160x50 pro won the Xi'an Marathon and Hefei Marathon championships, Wu Xiangdong wore 160x 50 Pro won the Chinese championship in Shanghai and Guangzhou.
In addition to the ace 160x series, Xtep's product matrix has been continuously strengthened. The newly released multi-scene racing carbon plate running shoe 260X focuses on "both competition and training", which meets the needs of a larger group of runners on race days, as well as the training scenarios of elite runners.
The professional product matrix with different positioning covers different running scenarios and groups of runners at different levels.
Looking back at the full return of the event and the complete one-year cycle of the recovery of various industries, the data reflects the reconstruction of the industry map. Xtep insists on co-creating with athletes and runners, empowering products with technology, and constantly polishing product performance with self-motivation, and the fruitful results brought by long-termism are becoming more and more obvious.
While consolidating its leading position in China's domestic road running industry, Xtep has overtaken foreign capital with "accelerated running" to achieve overall leadership. It is obvious to all that in this track with no end, Xtep is still "speeding up".