The 16th edition of the Asian Marathon Championship was held yesterday (26th) in Dongguan, China where the best Asian marathoners battled for the regional title.
In the Men’s segment India’s Gopi Thonkal became the first Indian Male to win Gold at the competition running a time of 2:15.48 secs coming ahead of Uzbekistan’s Petrov Andrey (2:15.51 sec) and Mongolian Tseveenravadan Byambajav (2:16.14) who won Silver and Bronze respectively.
Sri Lankan Marathoner Pradeep Arunasiri who competed in his first international competition impressed finishing 10th in the race with a personal best time of 2:20.58 secs. Arunasiri is believed to be one of the front runners to take over from Sri Lanka’s leading marathoner Indrajith Cooray, provided he continues to improve on his timing.
The other Sri Lankan participant at the competition Niluka Rajasekara who became the first female Olympian marathoner of the country when she represented the Island at the Rio Summer Olympics had an “outing to forget” finishing the race in the 11th position clocking 2:47.43 secs. It was huge dip in performance by the marathoner who previously clocked her personal best time of 2:40.07secs at the same competition in 2015 which earned her qualification to the World Athletic Championship and to the Rio Summer Olympics. Rajasekara will be hoping her off season regime will come in good stead for her to improve her time to be able to be competitive in the upcoming Asian Games competition in Indonesia.
North Korea claimed the Gold and the Bronze medals in the women’s segment through Kim Hye Gong (2:28.52secs) and Jo Un Ok respectively while Keiko Nogami won the Silver medal.
 in Dongguan, China where the best Asian marathoners battled for the regional title.){kind=link}