Side Story 1

My daughter, Witolum Pedes, is an undeniable genius.

Even before she entered elementary school, I always suspected her basic physical abilities were unusually high. But I assumed that was just because I was comparing her to children who weren’t Uma Musume. I knew I was being a doting parent.

The first time I truly realized something was off was when she was six. I came home from shopping and found my daughter running around while carrying my husband on her back.

My husband seemed to think, “Well, that’s just how Uma Musume are,” but compared to how I was as a child, it was clearly abnormal. Her core strength and muscle power were astonishing.

The decisive moment came during her elementary school sports day. Because competing directly against humans is dangerous for Uma Musume, once the kids reach a certain age, the sports day includes a short-distance race specifically for them.

On the starting line, she wore a face that said, “Ugh, what a hassle,” and I worried whether she would even take it seriously—but she betrayed my expectations in the best possible way.

The moment the race began, she left everything behind with beautiful form and explosive acceleration—so sharp I wondered if she had stepped straight out of the Twinkle Series. The amount of dirt she kicked up made her usual laziness seem like a lie, and the fact that she wasn’t even winded afterward suggested incredible stamina as well.

People around us simply thought she was “fast,” but as someone who once attended Tracen Academy—even if only marginally—I understood. She’d been blessed with terrifying talent.

And yet, in stark contrast to that talent, my daughter was hopelessly lazy.

As someone who once pushed herself so hard I nearly destroyed my legs just to barely reach the Open Class during my racing days, her attitude frustrated me endlessly. Of course, I had retired because of those leg injuries, so I can’t exactly say that brutal training is the correct answer either.

Still, my daughter showed absolutely no interest in running, no matter how much I hoped she might. Meanwhile, my husband kept praising her out of simple parental pride without grasping the depth of her talent. After thinking long and hard about what to do, I eventually reached a rather desperate conclusion: “I’ll lure her with entertainment.”

She didn’t seem especially interested in running on her own legs, but since she often played competitive video games with my husband on weekends, I figured she didn’t dislike competition itself.

If she entered tournaments—winning some and losing some—she might discover the fun of racing. And if that required bribing her with pocket money for the first few races, well… if it ultimately led to something good for her, I was willing to do it.

She didn’t train at a local club, didn’t belong to any prestigious team, and didn’t have a dedicated coach. Honestly, the whole situation could only be described as “underprepared,” if not outright naive. And yet, I genuinely believed that this child might somehow make it work anyway.

However, once the lid was opened, what followed was nothing short of domination.

Race distance, opponents, weather, course conditions—none of it mattered. She won everything. She simply won.

She’d trail behind the lead girl until the final stretch, then overtake her in the last hundred meters and leave her completely behind. Race after race, she repeated this. Girls seen as future stars, girls who had built their strength at prestigious clubs, girls from families famous in racing—even I recognized some of those names. My daughter brushed aside every single challenge with ease. No—in truth, she likely wasn’t even conscious of doing so.

To her, racing didn’t seem like a game with winners and losers. It was more like “something she had to get done.” Whenever I brought up race-related topics, she would remember the names of girls she’d run with multiple times, but beyond that, she never had much to say.

I could only hold my head in my hands. And she still refused to enter tournaments unless I presented some kind of “bait.”

Eventually, she discovered that the bookstore gift cards she received for winning could be used to buy weekly shonen magazines.

As for the medals and certificates that came with them—I eventually found them all shoved into a cardboard box, so now I display them in my bedroom. And the reason I say “came with them” is because my oblivious daughter often went home before the awards ceremony, so everything had to be mailed afterward.

If no new games were coming out and she didn’t want anything, she simply stopped entering tournaments and holed up at home. For a while, people even whispered that she might be sickly. When I heard that rumor, it was hard not to laugh.

As the time to enter Tracen Academy approached, the atmosphere around our home gradually grew noisier.

At first, she was just known as a “fast Uma Musume in the region,” but as she kept winning—and kept completely overwhelming other rising stars—her reputation skyrocketed. Once her tournament results earned her a recommendation for Tracen Academy, even the academy’s trainers began coming to watch her races.

The girl in question, however, seemed completely unfazed—whether because she was naturally strong under pressure or simply oblivious, I wasn’t sure. She never even noticed that she was featured right next to her usual shonen magazine in the “Spotlight Uma Musume” special issues.

A brooding expression as she dismissed any opponent. A solitary genius. A final sprint so explosive it seemed to erupt right before the finish line. Photos of her filled the pages, describing how other Uma Musume looked as if they’d run into an invisible glass wall trying to stop her last surge.

Naturally, everyone assumed she would go to the central Tracen Academy in Fuchu. I hoped for that too.

And, even more surprisingly, my daughter herself seemed willing. Maybe—just maybe—she had enjoyed racing more than she ever let on… Though her usual behavior never made it obvious. Still, since she spoke clearly and firmly even in front of that chairwoman, I wanted to believe she would be fine.