Olympian Sandeep Kumar fell 39 seconds short of bettering his own personal best but was still good enough to win the 50km at the fifth National race walking championships here on Saturday.
Sandeep completed the walk in 3:56:39:71 seconds, just a little slower than his National record of 3 hours and 56 minutes.
It was also off the 3:55:00 mark set by the Athletics Federation as qualifying criterion for the 2018 Asian Games. AFI general secretary C.K. Valson, however, said Sandeep might still be considered.
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He is now hoping to improve his timing at the Team Racewalking World Cup in China in May and is likely to be accompanied by Jitendra Rathore, who clocked 3:58:55.82 to take silver at the Jawaharlal Nehru Stadium here, and bronze-medalist Damen Singh (4:00:34:48).
The Under-20 girls’ 10km event saw Priyanka Patel set a new national record, bettering her namesake’s performance from 14 years ago with a timing of 49:01:81.
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The results:
Men’s 50km: 1. Sandeep Kumar (3:56:39:71), 2. Jitendra Rathore (3:58:55.82), 3. Damen Singh (4:00:34:48).
10km: Girls : 1. Priyanka Patel (49:01:81), 2. Bandana Patel (51:23:52), 3. Ramandeep Kaur (52:12:18).
Boys: 1. Akashdeep Singh (43:04.65), 2. Hardeep (43:36.62), 3. Mandeep (43:36:67) .