Marathon runners receive awards

Bernard PERERA

Sri Lanka's long distance runners men and women who teamed up to compete at four International Marathons sponsored by Standard Chartered Bank received their awards on Thursday at the Athletic Association auditorium.

The eight men and women Marathoners received the highest prize money to the value of US dollars 116,000.

These Marathon named as the 'Great Run on Earth' was run on four locations Nairobi, Singapore, Mumbai and Hong Kong. The mens team comprising Sujeeva Chandrapala, Jeevakumaran Sivaperumal, Ajith Bandara and Ishan Kumara. This quartet recorded a cumulative time of 10 hrs. 21.32 secs from the four stages. They also made sure that Sri Lanka stay ahead of Thailand specially due to the excellent run by Ishan Kumara in Hong Kong who clocked 2 hrs. 24.02 secs to run his best race.

The women Marathoners did a perfect performance in the Regions final to outclass Indonesia by four seconds. This was mainly due to Manjula Kumarasinghe's personal best run to clock 3 hrs. 00.04 secs. The women's quartet comprising Chandrawathi Marasinghe, Ruvina Deepani, Lakmini Bogahawatte and Manjula. They clocked 12 hrs. 29.35 secs for the four stages.

Major General Palitha Fernando, President Athletic Association addressing the gathering said that the runners' achievement is proof to show the world that Sri Lanka is a country which can develop more on long distance running. The teams that competed at these Marathons given an example to prove what they are capable of at international level.

Sri Lanka is a fine location to produce long distance runners, we must make use this for future development, said Major General Fernando.

Standard Chartered Bank since 2004 has done a lot to improve the standard of long distance running. The Bank has sponsored all these runners to compete at 16 international races. This has helped the runners to achieve this success and also the biggest prize money offered to these runners. This is also an encouragement for all aspiring long distance runners to continue to win and also to bring honour to their motherland.