Athletes from as many as 20 different countries are choosing to warm up for the Beijing Olympics in nearby Japan. Athletes have cited the better environment, training facilities and its short distance to China as reasons to do their final training in Japan.

400 meter hurdle champion from Australia Jane Rawlinson, will even arrive in Beijing after the opening ceremony.

“I am going to avoid it until I have to race in it,” Rawlinson said.

“We picked the same place where we prepared last year for the world championships (in Osaka) because we had a very good experience there,” Eberhard Vollmer, a spokesman for the German athletics federation, said Thursday. “The climate is nearly identical, we can work off the jet lag and just the entire surroundings were good.”

Read more: Olympic athletes choose Japan for training ahead of Beijing Games