All nine finishers in women's 10km race walk event better National Games record

In an unprecedented result, all the nine competitors who on Tuesday finished the women's 10km race walk event in the National Games here bettered the earlier Games record set 26 years ago.

Eleven athletes started the race but two could not finish. National record holder Priyanka Goswami entered her name but did not start the race, which returned to the National Games for the first time after the 1999 edition in Manipur.

Haryana's Ravina, who had won the National Inter-State and National Open Championships last year in 20km event, clinched the gold with a time 45.52 seconds, bettering the earlier Games record of 51.56 seconds set by Y Bala Devi of Manipur in the 1999 Games in Imphal.

All the other eight athletes who followed Ravina at the finish line also clocked better times than the earlier Games record of 51.56 seconds.

They are Shalini (46.12 seconds) of Uttarakhand, Munita Prajapati (46:23) of Uttar Pradesh, Mokavi Muthurathinam (46.23) of Tamil Nadu, Payal (47.36) of Uttarakhand, Reshma Patel (48.16) of Uttar Pradesh, Mansi Negi (48.32) of Uttarakhand, Sejal Singh (49.33) of Maharashtra and Monika (51.45) of Haryana.

Only Ravina's timing will, however, be considered as the new national record in the record books.

In the men's 20km event, six competitors out of 10 who finished the race bettered the earlier Games record of 1 hour, 23 minutes and 26 seconds set by Gurmeet Singh of Jharkhand in the 2011 edition.

Servin Sebastian of Services, who won the 20km race walk event at the National Open Championships, took the gold with a personal best time of 1:21:23. His earlier personal best was 1:21:39.

Uttarakhand's Suraj Panwar, who competed at the 2024 Paris Olympics in the marathon race walking mixed relay event along with Priyanka Goswami, took the silver with a time of 1:21:34, while Amanjot Singh of Punjab secured the bronze, clocking 1:21:42.

Paramjeet Singh Bisht of Services, who competed in the Paris Olympics 20km race walk event, was fourth with a time of 1:22:02. Ram Baboo of Uttar Pradesh, who won a bronze in mixed 35km race walk at the 2022 Asian Games, was fifth with 1:22:26, while Mukesh Nitharwal of Rajasthan sixth with 1:22:52.

In fact, the race walk events were initially not in the 38th National Games here as the Athletics Federation of India (AFI) had decided to exclude them because it wanted the elite race walkers to participate in select competitions so that they could achieve their peak in major international events.

Later, on the request from the Games organisers, the AFI reversed it decision and included the race walk events. But, instead of the women's 20km event, which has been held in the past seven editions, the AFI decided to have the 10km event.

The men's 20km event was kept unchanged.