Who is Kihachiro Onitsuka? Onitsuka was a military veteran who eventually decided to venture into the shoe business. He began making footwear for top athletes under the business name "Onitsuka Co." This company started small with just a handful of employees and initially sought to produce basketball shoes.

This product was worn in various professional sporting events, thus paving the way for Onitsuka to build a global sporting empire. Are ASICS and Onitsuka the same company? marks the 50th anniversary of one of Nike’s greatest sneakers, the Cortez. An iconic silhouette, the Cortez has evolved from being a technologically advanced running shoe (at the time it was released) to becoming a pop culture icon, finally resting on being an all-time classic.

For one of the company's first shoe models, Onitsuka found inspiration in a dish of octopus salad. He compared the shoe's grip to the suction power of an octopus tentacle. With this strength, the shoe allowed athletes to elevate their game. It was named "Onitsuka Tiger". On September 29, 2007, Onitsuka passed away from heart failure at a hospital in Kobe, Japan. The quote “if you fail, keep going until you succeed” is one way to describe how Mr. Onitsuka lived his extraordinary life. He was 89. Kihachiro Onitsuka’s 100th birthday, 2018. Vissel Kobe is a Japanese professional football club who won a championship in the 2019 season. Their home, away, third and goalkeeper shirts are all being designed and made by ASICS. 5. Novac Djokovic, 2019. Yoshida, a Japanese freestyle wrestler, wore ASICS' wrestling footwear and singlet to win a gold medal in international women’s wrestling. 4. Vissel Kobe, 2019.

Italian international men's gold medalist Stefano Baldini and Japanese international women’s marathon gold medalist Mizuki Noguchi wore ASICS' marathon shoes. 3. Saori Yoshida, 2012. The sneaker played such a huge role in the film that they have since become synonymous with it much like the Air Jordan 4s worn by Spike Lee in the 1989 basketball film ‘Do The Right Thing’.

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ASICS partnered with Serbian tennis professional, Novak Djokovic to launch an exclusive new tennis shoe, the Court FF NOVAK. The passing of Kihachiro Onitsuka, 2007. During the late ‘60s, the Cortez wasn’t made of leather as we know it today. During its time being manufactured by Blue Ribbon Sports and Tiger, the shoe was made out of nylon resin that aimed to create a lightweight feel that still provides the ample support needed for a long-distance running sneaker. In an advert seen from this time by BRS (Blue Ribbon Sports), they call the technology ‘Swoosh Fiber’. While this is not mentioned as an inspiration behind the Nike ‘Swoosh’ we all know today, the name does seem to reference the iconic Nike logo in a way that seems too close to be a coincidence.