76-yr-old from Allahabad bags 4 bronze in Masters athletic meet
ALLAHABAD : A septuagenarian from Allahabad has bagged four bronze medals for India in the recently concluded 20th Asia Masters Athletics Championship held in Rugao, China.
The performance of Shivnath, 76, has helped India bag a total of 146 medals, including 37 golds, 43 silvers and 66 bronze and finish second behind host China.
In all, 20 countries participated in the meet held between September 24 and September 28.
The 200-odd member Indian contingent had four athletes from UP who between them won seven medals, including two gold medals.
70-year-old PN Mishra of Gorakhpur won gold in hammer throw, Saifai’s 35-year-old Siddharth Krishna, who bagged a bronze in 5000 meter walk and 35-year-old Lal Bahadur Yadav of Kanpur w won a gold in Hammer throw besides Shivnath who brought home four bronze medals in 2000 meter hurdles, 80 meters hurdles, 4x100 meters relay and 4x400 meters relay race.
A former flying officer of Indian Air Force (IAF), Shivnath is an international athlete and a national champion in steeplechase in Masters Athletics Championship in 2013 and 2014 held in Bangalore and Coimbatore respectively securing gold medals.
Buoyed over his China success, the Mutthiganj locality resident is already looking forward to participate in the World Masters Athletics, to be held next year.
“I am ecstatic over winning the four bronze medals. I participated against doctor’s advice and overcame osteoporosis to win the medals. Now I plan to gear up for the World Masters Athletics 2018 and have already finalized my preparation plans,” shared Shivnath, a father of three sons. He retired from IAF in 1996. The grand dad has many impressive records to his credit after he started participating in Indira Marathon in 2000.
He had secured 5th position in 4x100 meter relay race in 21st World Masters Athletics Championship held in Leon, France in 2015 and where he had also secured 6th and 13th positions in 4X400 meter relay race and 2000metre steeplechase respectively. As per the guidelines of Masters Athletics, anyone over the age of 35 can take part in the event with the only entry requirements being that participants must wear his/her country’s uniform and be signed up with a temporary Masters Athletics Membership.
Senior vice-president, Masters Athletics Federation of India— an affiliated unit of World Masters Athletics—KN Tiwari praised performances of these veteran athletes.
“Shivnath is a great ambassador of sports and his performance along with performance of other veteran athletes is a great motivation for all Indian sportspersons,” he added.