Bengaluru, April 27: In normal circumstances, top distance runners would not race major events in short gaps. However, Abhishek Pal and Sanjivani Jadhav showed exceptional courage to finish on top among Indians just a few days after running with top-class athletes during the Federation Cup under the scorching sun in Kochi, a qualifying competition for the upcoming Asian Championships in Korea.
Abhishek, an Asian championship bronze medalist in 2023, improved his 10K best to 29:12 to finish seventh overall. His earlier 10K best also came in the TCS World 10K, when he clocked 30:05 here in 2022. Sawan Barwal, who joined Abhishek in the Indian Team to Gumi, clocked an impressive 29:45 on his 10K debut.
The highly experienced Sanjivani, who secured two gruelling distance running double in Kochi, was a bit slower than her last year’s winning time in Bengaluru while retaining the top spot among women in 34:16.
The top Indian finishers were awarded Rs 3,00,000 each for their efforts while Abhishek Pal also walked away with Rs 100,000 for setting a new event record.
It was a day of delight for the Ugandan runners, as Sarah Chelangat and Joshua Cheptegei took home the top prize in their respective sections in TCS World 10K, a World Athletics Gold Label Road Race, held here on Sunday. Incidentally, they were the first athletes from their country to take home the World 10K titles, along with a prize of USD 26,000 each.
When the women took the starting line-up at 5:30 am, a big question arose in the minds of fans and followers as eight of the best women with personal best timings faster than the event records set their foot on the Bengaluru roads.
However, Sarah had a different strategy in mind as she broke away from the rest of the runners after the first two kilometres and maintained the lead thereafter.
Sarah increased her pace once she parted from the rest of the field and passed through the halfway mark at 15:23.
At that stage, it was 20 seconds faster than that of Cintia and Ethiopians Guteni Shanko and Asmarech Anley. The gap started widening bigger and bigger thereafter, as Sarah had not looked back to see where her rivals were at any point in the race. (IANS)
