Race walker Manish Singh Rawat would be eyeing a Tokyo Olympics berth when the two-day National Open and International Race Walking Championships commences in Ranchi on Saturday. The Uttarakhand athlete had finished a creditable 13th at the 2016 Rio Olympics, clocking 1:21.21 sec in the 20km event.
The men’s and women’s 20km race will be held on day one while the men’s 50km and junior (U-20) will take place Sunday. The Olympic qualification for race walk and marathon, which started last year in January, will conclude on May 31.
Army’s KT Irfan, 29, is the only Indian to have qualified for Tokyo. He clocked 1:20.57 sec at last year’s Asian Race Walking Championships at Nomi, Japan in March, bettering the Tokyo qualifying standard of 1: 21.00. But at the Doha World Championships in September-October 2019, he finished 27th, timing 1:35.21 sec.
Devender Singh, who clocked 1:20:21 sec at Nomi in 2016 to set a national record, is among 27 athletes entered in the 20km race. At the Doha World Championships, he finished 36th, clocking 1:41.48 sec.
The women’s 20km event will be without defending champion Soumya Baby, who hold the national record of 1:31.29 sec set in 2018. The qualifying time for Tokyo is 1:31.00. The field too is thin with only 18 athletes in the fray.
{{/usCountry}}The women’s 20km event will be without defending champion Soumya Baby, who hold the national record of 1:31.29 sec set in 2018. The qualifying time for Tokyo is 1:31.00. The field too is thin with only 18 athletes in the fray.
{{/usCountry}}In the 50km event too, Haryana’s Sandeep Kumar, who hold the national record of 3 hours, 56 minutes, has opted out to focus on 20km, thus reducing the field to 13 athletes.