Long-distance runner Gulveer Singh continued his record-breaking spree and improved his national 10,000m record at the Ten Track Festival, an event on the World Athletics Continental Tour, clocking 27:00.22 seconds to finish sixth in San Juan Capistrano, California, on Sunday.
The timing was an improvement of more than 14 seconds from his previous record of 27:14.88, which he set in Hachoji, Japan, last November. Gulveer came agonisingly close to qualifying for September’s World Athletics Championships, missing the qualification mark of 27:00.00 by just 22 milliseconds.
“The target was to go below 27 minutes and clock 26:58 or 26:59. When I talked to him before the race, his body was feeling good, and we were expecting a fast race,” Gulveer’s coach from the Army, Yunus Khan, told The Indian Express. “I know 14 seconds is a big improvement, but the reason is continuous training. He hasn’t missed one day of training. Whenever he gets back from Colorado Springs, he trains with us at the High Altitude Center in Ooty.”
Currently serving as Naib Subedar in the Indian Army, Gulveer started his year with training at Ooty before joining India’s foreign coach Scott Simmons in Colorado Springs, USA.
This is not the first time Gulveer has rewritten the national record in the 10,000m. He shattered the long-standing national mark of 28:02.89s in the name of Surender Singh in March 2024, clocking 27:41.81s at last year’s edition of the Ten Track Meet. Later in November, he clocked 27:14.88s to re-write his record and overtook the timing of Japan’s Jun Kasai’s 27:17.46s as the best Asian performance of the year.
On Sunday, Gulveer didn’t just break the national record, he clocked the third-best Asian time ever in 10,000m behind Ahmed Hassan Abdullah (26:38.76s) and Nicholas Kemboi (26:51.87s).
For Gulveer, a 2023 Asian Games medallist, it was the third national record he has broken this year already. Kicking off his season at the David Hemery Valentine Invitational meet in Boston, he broke the 17-year-old national record in the 3000m short track event. He clocked 7:38.26 to better Surender Singh’s mark (7:49.47) set in 2008.
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At the same meeting, the 26-year-old became the first-ever Asian to go below 13 minutes in the 5,000m short track event, clocking 12:59.77s and improving upon his own mark of 13:11.82s.
The athlete from Aligarh, now holds national records in 10,000m, 5,000m and 3,000m. Gulveer is yet to compete in India this year, after doing so in August 2024 at the National Open Athletics.
Among other Indians in action at the meet, Kartik Kumar clocked 28:11.34s in the other 10,000m race while Rahul clocked 3:41.10s in men’s 1,500m to finish eighth.
Ankita finished third in women’s 1,500m with a time of 4:13.97 seconds while Seema, competing in women’s 10,000m, clocked 32:14.66 seconds to finish 19th.