New Delhi, March 15 (IANS) India’s star distance runner, Gulveer Singh, has improved the national men’s half-marathon (21km) record in a competition in New York on Sunday.

According to information received from the Athletics Federation of India (AFI), the 27-year-old army runner clocked 59:42 to finish third in the New York City Half Marathon. Adriaan Wildschutt of South Africa was first with a time of 59:30, followed by Moroccan-born American long-distance runner Zouhair Talbi, whose time was 59:41.

The previous national record of 1:00:30 was set by steeplechase specialist Avinash Sable in 2020 at the Delhi Half Marathon.

Gulveer Singh has now become the first Indian distance runner to hold multiple national records, ranging from the 3,000m track to the 25km road race. The Asian Games medallist also holds the men’s 5,000m and 10,000m track records.

Gulveer had a good run at the 2025 Asian Athletics Championships, winning both the 5,000m and 10,000m track races. This year, he is confident of a podium finish at both the Glasgow Commonwealth Games in July and the Asian Games in September.

“I’m fit and looking forward to good results in upcoming major international races,” Gulveer was quoted as saying by AFI in a release on Sunday.

The army runner is currently based out of Colorado Springs in the USA.

Gulveer was recently added to the Target Olympic Podium Scheme’s (TOPS) Core group following a recent assessment of performances, along with rising pistol shooters Samrat Rana and Suruchi Singh and world champion para-shuttler Pramod Bhagat.

Last year, Gulveer Singh had 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.

The timing was an improvement of more than 14 seconds from his previous record of 27:14.88, which he set in Hachoji, Japan, in November 2024. Gulveer came agonizingly close to qualifying for the World Athletics Championships 2025, missing the qualification mark of 27:00.00 by just 22 milliseconds.

–IANS

bsk/