KATHMANDU, April 11: Arjun Dhakal of Armed Police Force has won men’s marathon gold in the ongoing Fifth National Games Saturday morning. Dhakal completed the 42 kilometers 195 meters in 2 hours 36 mins 6 seconds to claim the gold medal. Narayan Deshar of Nepal Police bagged silver in the competition by completing the race in 2:36:15. Amar Bahadur Shahi of APF completed the race in 2:37:18 to win bronze medal. Dhakal started well but he failed to maintain the speed in the final stages and failed to break his best of 2:26:00 registered in Frankfurt in 2006 by more than four minutes. [break]
“Lack of good competition is the cause of my bad timing,” said Dhakal after the race. “If Nepal Army had participated in the event, my result would have been a lot better because Arjun Basnet and Rajendra Bhandari are very good long distance runners,” Dhakal added. “Tough competition inspires us to perform better” Dhakal quipped, “I trained better this time with coach Sushil Nar Singh Rana, but easy race deprived me an improved timing.”
Nepal Army pulled out from six events including athletics after Maoist affiliated PLA Sports Club participated in these events at the eleventh hour.
Dhakal had earlier won Toyota Marathon 2005, Kathmandu Marathon 2007 and Rastriya Banijya Bank Half-marathon twice.
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