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Home > Sports > Mumbai Marathon 2004 > Trivia
India has four marathons in a year: the National Marathon, organised by the Amateur Athletic Federation of India; Pune International Marathon; Rath Indian Open Marathon, in New Delhi, and the Indira Gandhi Marathon, in Allahabad.
Chota Singh won the marathon gold in 1951 Asian Games in Delhi with a timing of 2 hours, 42.6 minutes. He is the only Indian to have won the event at the Games.
Shivnath Singh clocked 2 hours 12 minutes at Jalandhar on May 28, 1978. Among women, Asha Agarwal holds the record of 2 hours 40 minutes 26 seconds, set in New Delhi on Feb 17, 1991.
The Rath Marathon, sponsored by Shriram Industrial Enterprises Ltd, was the first women's marathon. It was held on October 24, 1982, in Delhi. Sudha Madhavan won the race in 5 hours 29 minutes and 30 seconds. The following year 20-year-old Asha Agarwal won the race in 3 hours 87 minutes and 13 seconds. Asha went on to represent India at Nagoya, Japan, on March 4, 1984.
Sunita Godara holds the record of running the maximum marathons run by an Indian. She has runs in 71 full marathons, starting with the Rath Marathon in 1984. She finished first 25 times, second 12 times and third 14 times. In addition to that, she won 23 half marathons and has runs 200 international races in all continents. In 1990 she clocked 2 hours 49.21 minutes to become the first Indian to win a world class race. She won medals in the Penang and Kedah marathons. She also carried the Olympic Torch at the 1996 Centennial Olympics at Atlanta.
Suman Mehta, who started her career with the 800 metres, beat Sunita Godara by clocking 2 hours 43.04 minutes in 1993. Suman won two bronze medals in the 3,000m at Bangkok, three golds at the 1987 SAF Games (1,500, 3,000, 10,000 metres) before running the marathon from 1987 to 1993.
Asha Agarwal won the Hong Kong marathon on January 27, 1985. In September 1985 she won the gold at the Asian Track and Field meet in Jakarta, setting a record of 2 hours 48 minutes and 51 seconds, which still stands. She also won the Freedom Race in Delhi in 1989, Trinidad Marathon in 1986 and has run eight out of 26 marathons below 2 hours 50 minutes.
Phadeppa Dareppa Chaugule is India's first Olympic marathon runner. He3 represented India in the 1920 Antwerp Games and finished 19th with a timing of 2 hours 50 minutes 45.2 seconds. Johanen Kolhemeinen of Finland (2 hr 32 min 35.8 sec) won the gold at the Games.
The late Jagmal Singh, who had a national record of 2 hours 25 minutes and 59.8 seconds, represented India at the Rome Olympics at the age of 40.
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