Kartik Kumar improves men’s 10,000m record his coach clocked in 2007

Kartik Kumar was eight years old when his coach and former international distance runner Surendra Singh achieved a significant milestone. He clocked 29 minutes and 06.17 seconds in the men’s 10,000m race to etch his name in the record books during the 2007 edition of the National Inter State Senior Athletics Championship.

Sixteen years later on Thursday at the eight-lane Kalinga Stadium in Bhubaneswar, promising distance runner Kumar from Uttar Pradesh bettered his coach's performance by clocking 29:01.84 seconds to win the gold.

On his way to the win, Kumar also earned a ticket to the Hangzhou Asian Games, scheduled to be held in China in September. Despite the warm conditions, the pace was pretty good and the top four runners bettered the Asian Games qualifying time of 29:30.

Gulveer Singh (29:03.78 secs), Pritam Kumar (29:22.36 secs) and Harman Jot Singh (29:26.86 secs) were the other three runners who managed to finish within the Asian Games 10,000m qualification time.

While Surendra is overseeing the national long distance camp in Bengaluru, Kumar, an employee of the Indian army along with other elite athletes, is attending the camp to prepare for upcoming international meets.

Incidentally, Surendra holds the national 10,000m record of 28:02 secs, clocked in 2008.

Kumar’s next target is to win a medal at the Asian Games.

“Last year in October, I clocked a sub-29 minutes time for 10,000m. My goal in the coming weeks is to further improve my time,” Kumar told Sportskeeda in the post-race interaction.

Abhishek Pal of Uttar Pradesh, the pre-race favorite, quit the race with nine laps to go due to stomach cramps.

“I missed the chance to qualify for the Asian Games,” he rued.

In the women’s 25-lap event, Seema of Himachal Pradesh upset her more experienced rival Sanjivani Jadhav of Maharashtra. In a tactical race, Seema pushed for home in the last two rounds to cross the finish line in 34:20.01 seconds. Seema’s performance at the eight-lane Kalinga Stadium was nearly two minutes slower than the Asian Games qualification time of 32:30.24 seconds.

“I could have done better had someone pushed me in the last 2km of the 25-lap event,” Seema said in a post-race interaction.

While Sanjivani was considered the pre-race favorite to win the gold, she admitted that it wasn’t her day. The Maharashtra international runner conserved her energy to push hard in the second half of the race, but she wasn’t able to execute her pre-race plans and eventually finished second.

“My goal today was to qualify for the Asian Games, but I fell short of my target,” Sanjivani said.

Sanjivani recently clocked a personal best of 32:46 seconds in the women’s 10,000m event at the Portland Track Festival and was hopeful of improving her performance in the next race.

The men 20km race walk saw Haryana's seasoned athlete Sandeep Kumar take home the gold medal, while Bhawna Jat of Rajasthan added the women’s 20km race walk title to her profile. Bhawna’s gold medal-winning time of 1:37:03.00 was better than the previous meet record of 1:39:00, clocked by Deepmala Devi in 2006.

Results (all finals):

Men: 10,000m: Kartik Kumar (Uttar Pradesh) 29:01.84 secs, Gulveer Singh (UP) 29:03.78 secs, Pritam Kumar (Delhi) 29:22.36 secs.

20km race walk: Sandeep Kumar (Haryana) 1:27:12, Servin S (Tamil Nadu) 1:28:21, Hardeep (Haryana) 1:28:57

Women: 10,000m: Seema (Himachal Pradesh) 34:20.01 secs, Sanjivani Jadhav (Maharashtra) 34:34.10 secs, Poonam Dinkar (Maharashtra) 34:45.42 secs.

20km race walk: Bhavna Jat (Rajasthan) 1:37:03.00, Priyanka Goswani (UP) 1:40:33.00, Vandana (Karnataka) 1:41:54.00.