Haryana’s Amit set a new national record in the boys under-20 10km race which was the highlight of the second and final day of the seventh National Race Walking Championships on Morabadi Road, Ranchi on Sunday. He had set a national mark for boys under-16 5km in Ranchi in November 2018.

Amit set the new national record with a winning time of 40 minutes 28 seconds to better the mark set by Akshdeep Singh in the National Junior Athletics Championships in Ranchi in November 2018. On Sunday, he led the bunch of six athletes who met the World Junior Athletics Championships qualification standard of 43:30.

Paramjeet Singh Bisht (Uttarakhand), Parveen Kumar (Haryana), Vishvendra Singh (Madhya Pradesh), Sanjay Kumar (Rajasthan) and Bajrang Prajapati (Uttar Pradesh) were the others who came home inside that mark. Amit, who improved on his personal best by more than three minutes, stole everyone else’s thunder with a flawless performance.

Munita Prajapati, 18, drew double delight in beating familiar rival Baljeet Kaur Bajwa in the girls under-20 10km and achieving the World Junior Athletics Championships qualification standard of 50:30 with a winning time of 50:15.00. Punjab’s Baljeet Kaur Bajwa finished one second slower than that standard. The defending champion Roji Patel (Uttarakhand) won bronze this time.

Manipur’s Sanabam Daman Singh, 30, won the men’s 50km but the Olympic qualification standard of 3:50:00.00 was a bridge too far. But for someone who could not complete the course in the last National Race Walking Championships in Chennai, he drew some satisfaction by climbing the top of the podium with a winning time of 4:08:10.00.

In a testimony to tenacity and experience, it was 35-year-old Gurpreet Singh who finished second ahead of a trio of younger race walkers. Last year’s winner Jitendra Rathore (Rajasthan) and runner-up Sagar Joshi (Gujarat) were among the eight competitors who did not finish the grueling race.

Results:

Men’s 50km: 1. Sanabam Daman Singh (Manipur) 4:08:10.00; 2. Gurpreet Singh (Punjab) 4:09:44.00; 3. Anjani Singh (Uttar Pradesh) 4:22:37.00

Boys (under-20) 10km: 1. Amit (Haryana) 40:28.00 (New National Record. Old: 40:47.78, Akshdeep Singh, Ranchi, 2018) ; 2. Paramjeet Bisht (Uttarakhand) 41:02.00; 3. Parveen Kumar (Haryana) 41:21.00

Girls (under-20) 10km: 1. Munita Prajapati (Uttar Pradesh) 50:15.00; 2. Baljeet Kaur Bajwa (Punjab) 50:31.00; 3. Roji Patel (Uttarakhand) 51:11.00.