Asics - Eternal Run

ASICS needed to launch the GLIDERIDE™ running shoe, drive fame and enhance the brand’s image in high-performance running. Sports brands celebrate whoever crosses the finish line first, runners obsess over the next finish line they’ll cross, but ASICS holds a more holistic view of running… What if the finish line actually holds runners back from reaching their true potential?  Introducing Eternal Run: The world’s first race without a finish line.

As running shoe brands are usually known more for fashion than performance, key running audiences no longer saw ASICS as the clear winner in the performance running category and its sales were declining. To build brand preference for ASICS among runners in key markets, ASICS created the GLIDERIDE™, an innovative shoe designed to help runners save energy as they run.

Our goal was to launch the GLIDERIDE™ into a crowded market and reassert ASICS as the go-to brand for high-performance running. We wanted to show that what really separates us from the competition is our mindset. And bring that to life by getting rid of one of running’s absolute mainstays, the finish line. 

With this in mind, we created the Eternal Run, a race without a finish line. We invited 23 athletes, influencers and journalists with varied running abilities to the Bonneville Salt Flats in Utah. Each was assigned a pace, but there was no set route or pacemakers. Instead, the runners took part in the ultimate race—a race against themselves. We created images, a two-minute media film, a one-minute brand film and a 10-minute documentary to tell our story to different audiences. While talent and journalists began their outreach as soon as the race finished.

This project won the Cannes Lions Grand Prix in Entertainment Lions for Sport and elevated Edelman to the first-ever PR agency to win a GP using their own idea.