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In 1961, Bikila ran marathons in Greece, Japan, and Košice in Czechoslovakia, all of which he won. Bikila entered the 1963 Boston Marathon and finished in just 5th place—the only time in his career that he finished a marathon and did not win. He returned to Ethiopia and he didn’t compete in another marathon until the one in Addis Ababa in 1964. He won this race, taking 2:23:14 to complete the course. 40 days prior to the 1964 Summer Olympics in Tokyo, during a training run near Addis Ababa, Abebe Bikila started to feel pain. Unaware of the cause of the pain, he attempted to overcome this pain but collapsed. He was taken to the hospital where he was diagnosed with acute appendicitis. He was operated on and shortly thereafter and even during his recovery period he started jogging in the hospital courtyard at night. Abebe Bikila traveled to Tokyo but was not expected to compete. He did enter the marathon. He used the same strategy as in 1960: to stay with the leaders until the 20 kilometer point, then slowly increase his pace. After 15 km he only had company from Ron Clarke of Australia and Jim Hogan of Ireland. Shortly before 20 km only Hogan was in contention and by 30 km, Bikila was 40 seconds in front of Hogan and two minutes in front of Kokichi Tsuburaya of Japan in third place. He entered the Olympic stadium alone to the cheers of 70,000 spectators. He finished the marathon in a new Olympic record time of 2:12:11:2; 4 minutes, 8 seconds in front of the silver medalist Basil Heatley of Great Britain. Kokichi Tsuburaya was third. He was the first athlete in history to win the Olympic marathon twice. After finishing he astonished the crowd: not appearing exhausted, he started a routine of stretching exercises. He later stated that he could have run another 10 kilometers. Bikila returned to Ethiopia to a hero's welcome once again. He was again promoted by the Emperor, and he received his own car, a white Volkswagen Beetle.