Summary

The girls are preparing to run in Sakura High's annual marathon, but Yui isn't looking forward to it.

Plot

Everyone at Sakura High is preparing for the annual marathon, and the light music club is no exception. Yui trains by running to school every morning, and Tsumugi tries to improve her stamina through eating healthy foods. Sawako suggests running in costumes to keep things interesting, but her idea is rejected.

Yui and Ui run into Sawako while she's buying supplies for the marathon, so she gives them a guided tour of the marathon route, but this only makes Yui more nervous about the race. Sawako offers Yui a rice cake to cheer her up, which Yui eats for lunch the following day.

In a final desperate attempt to have the race called off, Yui makes a bunch of weather dolls and hangs them upside down outside of her house, hoping they'll make it rain. But as the marathon finally arrives, the weather is sunny and clear.

Once the marathon starts, most students pair off into groups. Nodoka runs ahead so she can finish sooner, while Ui, Azusa, and Jun run together, but Mio, Ritsu, Tsumugi, and Yui get off to a slow start. Mio dreads finishing last and having an embarrassing picture taken, so she runs ahead and catches up with Ui's group, but ultimately decides to wait for her friends to catch up. This takes a while, because Yui gets distracted by something almost every couple of feet.

As most of the racers reach what Sawako calls "Heartbreak Hill," the differences in stamina become obvious: Jun is worn out and tells Ui and Azusa to go ahead without her. Yui isn't doing much better, so the other girls come up with various ideas to keep her in the race. This works for a while, but when they finally catch up to Jun, she is the first to notice that Yui has gone missing. Jun heads for the finish line to inform the teachers and Ui, while Ritsu, Mio, and Tsumugi search the race route, while Sawako looks on her own. Ui has finished the race, but doubles back because she has a good idea of where Yui is.

Ui leads the girls to her neighbor's house (which is close to the route), only to find that Yui is there, taking a break after she fell and skinned her knee. Ui heads back to school to tell everyone that Yui is safe, and Yui rejoins the race with the others. It is only in the home stretch that Yui recalls that since she ate one of rice cakes, there should be one less, and so the last person to finish wouldn't get one. This results in a mad dash for the finish line (angering Ritsu since that Yui still wants to eat an extra rice cake), with Mio tripping but managing to turn it into a neat roll-through, though she is still plenty embarrassed by it. After the race, the girls discover that Yui was overreacting and that there are still rice cakes left, but they're reserved for teachers. Mio becomes very disappointed and sad, so Yui apologizes profusely for wasting the rice cake and gives her red bean soup to Mio. This also reminds them that Sawako is still on the race route, looking for Yui.