Army’s race walker has established himself as India’s best in men’s 20km race walk by winning back-to-back competitions

Navneet Singh

In his formative years, Servin Sebastian was passionate about running. The ambitious youngster from Trichy in Tamil Nadu wanted to make a big impression in middle distance running.

However, endless running had its disadvantages. Sebastian’s brain often sent a warning signal that he was overdoing it. Incidentally he didn’t pay heed to his body. It resulted in Sebastian getting on the injured list.

“It was very upsetting as I wasn’t able to do what I liked the most,” Sebastian recalled.

At that point of time Sebastian’s local athletic coach in Trichy advised him to try race walking, a technical event. Nonetheless it kept the young athlete like Sebastian busy and fit.

A switch to race walking in 2016 was a turning point in Sebastian’s career. Two years later he joined the Indian Army. With better facilities in the Army, he marched forward each day.

On Saturday, Trichy’s international race walker showcased his potential to win a gold medal in the men’s 20km event at the 12th Indian Open National Race Walking competition in Chandigarh.

His gold winning time of 1:21:46.47 was better than the next month’s Asian Athletics Championship qualification criteria of 1:24:50 set by AFI (Athletics Federation of India).

Earlier this year Sebastian had won gold at the 38th National Games in Uttarakhand. “I’m happy with my performance in Chandigarh,” the army race walker said.

Sebastian said he could have done better but weather in Northern India at this time of the year was a bit taxing. Sebastian knows that it is important to remain injury free. “My goal is to stay healthy and injury free,” he added. “Hopefully I will be able to achieve a World Athletics qualification time of 1:19:20 for the men’s 20km race walk in the near future.”

Results

Men

20km race walk: Servin (Tamil Nadu) 1:21:46.47, Amit (Army) 1:21:51.46, Amanjot Singh (Army) 1:22:12.72.
35km race walk: Ram Baboo (Army) 2:32:53.50, Sandeep Kumar (Haryana) 2:35:05.75, Vijay Omkar V (SSCB) 2:41:41.49.
U20: 5km race walk: Tushar Panwar (Uttarakhand) 20:06.83, Sachin Garhwal (Rajasthan) 20:07.43, Ritik Kumar (Rajasthan) 20:20.52.

Women

20km: Ravina (Haryana) 1:35:58.80, Munita Prajapati (Uttar Pradesh) 1:38:05.60, Shalini (Uttarakhand) 1:39:18.90.
34km race walk: Payal (Railway Sports) 2:51:48.76, Manju Rani (Punjab) 2:55:34.19, Ramandeep Kaur (Punjab) 2:57:03.94.
Girls: U20: 5km race walk: Aarti (Haryana) 22:32.81, Mahima Choudhary (Rajasthan) 22:52.99, Payal (Haryana) 24:01.34.