Pavan Kumar, of the Indian Armed Forces, took away the honors, winning the Men’s leg of the first Vedan Haldighat Half Marathon, “Run to Breath”, while Anita Chowdhary from Mathura led the Women’s leg of the event.

Haldighati Half Marathon took place on October9, and was organized by Royon Samajik Sansthan, in association with Celebration Mall, Udaipur, Vedan India, Archaeological Survey of India and Creative Brain Academy.

The main leg of the Half Marathon covered the distance from Raqt Talai to Chetak Mausoleum through Shahi Bagh.  Runners from Bihar, Uttar Pradesh, Maharashtra, Chennai, Gujarat, Uttrakhand, Delhi and Haryana participated in the race along with athletes from Rajasthan, Armed Forces and Rajasthan Police.  School children also enthusiastically participated in the run.

Reverse Runner, Shyamdas Bairagi, who also participated in the Half Marathon was a prime attraction at the event.

Runners from the Armed Forces were the prime heavyweights in the race, taking away the first three awards.  Pawan completed the Marathon in 1hr:76min:46sec taking first place, whereas Ankul Kumar, again from the Armed Forces, completed the Half Marathon in 1hr:11min:31secs beating the third place winner Bharat Kumar by 27 seconds.

In the Women’s leg, Anita Chowdhary from Mathura clocked 1hr:25min:06secs to take the first place beating Rajasthan’s Indira Gehlot by 5minutes and 9seconds.

In the 10km run, Army man Tanwar Singh clocked 33mins:05seconds to take first place whereas Kanhaiya, his Army mate clocked 33min:31seconds to come in second, beating his Army compatriot Kailash Gujjar by 2minutes 26seconds.  Ritu Joshi from Rajasthan clocked 48min:07secs came in first, while Suniti, also from Rajasthan came in second with a time of 55min13secs.

Rajasthan’s Sohan Singh took first place in the 5km race, beating Ranki Das from the Army, while Vinay Kumar Lubhunia came in third. Rajasthan women took all the three positions in the 5km run, with Sonal Sukhwar clocking 24min:10secs, Lalita clocking 25mins:10secs and Kailash Meena taking 26min:47secs to complete the leg.

Hira Singh, Devendra and Vijay Sen took the first three positions respectively in the 2.5km run of the Men’s leg while Rani Sukhwal, Varsha Sukhwal and Pratima Chauhan took first three places in the Women’s leg.

The 2.5km Walkathon was won by Lokesh Kalal, with Praveen Soni and Manish taking second and third place respectively.  The Women’s leg was won by Madhu Saurabh.

Earlier, the Marathon was flagged off in the presence of MP Hari Om Singh Rathod; President of Royon, Dr. Ameed Murad; Padma Shri  Sriram Singh, Limba Ram; Olympians Sapna Puniya, Dhulchand Damor, Anil Puniya, Padma Shri Mohanlal Prajapati and Head of the Khamnor Panchayat Samiti, Shobha Purohit.

Arjuna Awardee Shri Ram Singh, Limba Ram, Dhulchand Damor and Sapna Puniya gave away the prizes to the Winners.  The special guests said that the Haldighati Half Marathon has given the youth a great platform to showcase their abilities, a few of whom could represent the country in time to come as well.