'Target is medal at Asian Games': Marathon record-breaker Barwal

Having recently smashed Indian athletics longeststanding national record marathon runner Sawan Barwal has set another goal winning the countrys first medal in the Asian Games since 1982 in the gruelling distance Indias last Asian Games medal in marathon was won by Hosur Kukkappa Seetharan at the 1982 Games in New Delhi Before that Chota Singh won a gold in the inaugural 1951 Asian Games in the national capitalThe legendary Shivnath Singh had held the national marathon record of 21200 for 48 years However on Sunday the 28yearold Barwal broke that longstanding mark at the NN Rotterdam Marathon finishing 20th with a new time of 21158 This year my main target will be Asian Games and I want to win a medal there I will not participate in too many events Barwal told PTI in an interview facilitated by Reliance FoundationI feel I can further improve my national record I could have run around 21000 even in Rotterdam had there been no cold wind So I can run faster than my current national record Next year there is Asian Marathon Championship Then I would want to give my best in the 2028 Olympics Barwal who is getting married next month broke the national record in his debut race but said he was confident of achieving the feat as he had been preparing for that race since January He was to run in the Valencia Marathon on December last year but an injury led to him missing itI was undergoing high altitude training at Coonoor and I was preparing well I was confident of breaking the national record The target was to run 21000 and everything went according to the plan till the 40km mark In the last two kilometers there were issues I did not anticipate the cold wind and moreover I had poured water on my body he explainedHe fell down twice acirciquestiquest at around the 100m mark from the finish line and again just 10acirciquestiquest20m before it I had a blackout of may be 10 to 15 seconds but a volunteer came and helped me in standing up Then I pulled through the finish line he reminisced Rotterdam was a flat track except for little up and down at the end with a bridge in the middle The climate was also good The highest temperature was 12 degreesHis coach at Reliance Foundation Ajith Markose said Barwal may run a couple of races either 5000m or 10000m later in the season but his main focus will be to win an Asian Games marathon medal He is a part of our Reliance Foundation Project 209 marathon programme The target this year is the Asian Games marathon medal Moreover he is getting married next year Markose saidHe will be chasing the medal in the Asian Games he will not be chasing for better time in Japan The coach said he knew that Barwal would do wonders as soon as he joined the programme in 2022 When he joined our 209 programme in 2022 we did physiology test like VO2max test and we found that his VO2max was very high 7879 ml per kg Thats the amount of oxygen that he can utilize That time without much training he was able to reach that level So we knew that he will be very good at long distance and marathon or half marathon So last few years we have been preparing him for marathon onlyA volunteer helped Barwal to stand upMarkose said Barwal was running according to plan up to 40 km but after that cold wind struck him and his head got numb I was following him in a metro because the route was little weird Most of the marathon routes will be a loop I can catch them again at 20km by just crossing the road It was not like that so I had to follow them in a metro I went to 20km then I got another metro to reach 30km mark Then I came to the finish lineI was 100m away from finish line and I was ready to take his pictures and videos We were sure that he is going to break the national record When the electronic time showed 21000 I couldnt see him at the finish line He was at that time just around 100m from the finish line And when I saw him I realised that he is going to fall downHe fell down but he managed to stand up and run And again within 1020m of the finish line he fell down He was completely out Luckily there was a volunteer who made him stand And somehow he crossed the finish line just few seconds within the national recordThis story has been sourced from a third party syndicated feed agencies Midday accepts no responsibility or liability for its dependability trustworthiness reliability and data of the text Midday managementmiddaycom reserves the sole right to alter delete or remove without notice the content in its absolute discretion for any reason whatsoever