Japan’s Takanashi wins 14th Safal Pokhara International Marathon

Kaski / Feb 15: Japanese national Takanashi Rosuki has clinched the 14th edition of the Safal Pokhara International Marathon title.

The marathon was held today and is organised by Former Sports Persons Forum Nepal.

Takanashi completed the marathon in 2 hours 26 minutes 51 seconds to win the title. He bagged Rs 200,000 cash prize.

Kiran Bogati of the Armed Police Force (APF) was in second place finishing the marathon in 2 hours 28 minutes 8 seconds. He won Rs 100,000. Bogati had won gold medal in the 13th South Asian Games (SAG).

Similarly, Anish Thapa Magar of Gandaki province came out third clocking 2 hours 29 minutes while Ganesh Singh Thakuri of the Armed Police Force who clocked 2 hours 41 minutes won the consolation prize.

Title winner Takanashi said he was greatly excited to win the marathon in Pokhara, coming from Komanage of Japan. He said ties between Pokhara and Komanage have deepened after the establishment of sister city relations between them. He said he and other athletes from Japan would participate in the marathon in the coming days as well.

Likewise, in the 10-kilometre male race, Purna Bahadur Karki came out first, Yangdev Rai second and Ashish Kunwar in the third place and received prize of Rs 15 thousand, Rs 10 thousand and Rs 5 thousand, respectively.

Towards women 10 kilometres race, Indrakala came out first, Anita Rai second and foreign athlete Wendy third and won cash prize of Rs 15 thousand, Rs 10 thousand and Rs 5 thousand respectively.

Likewise, Binod Gurung, Bibek Pariyar and Pradip Bhujel came out first, second and third respectively in the five-kilometre male race while Binu BK won the first place, Pratikshya Subedi the second place and Madhuri Devi Kurmi the third place in the women’s five-kilometre race.

The athlete coming in first place got Rs 10 thousand, the athlete coming out second received Rs 7 thousand and the athlete coming out third got Rs 4 thousand towards both male and female category.

Pramod Dahal, Ashik Khwauji and Prem Kshetri came out first, second and third respectively in the male blind race while Binita Pun, Srijana Pariyar and Sukamaya BK took the first, second and third position respectively towards the female blind race.

Towards the male wheelchair race, Suresh Gauli came out first and Bharat Adhikari second while Poonam BK came out first, Dhana Magar second and Laxmi Sunar third in the female wheelchair race. Both male and female athlete coming out first received Rs 5 thousand, those coming out in second place received Rs 3 thousand and those coming out third got Rs 2,000 in the wheelchair category.

Gandaki State chief minister Prithvi Subba Gurung, state government ministers and State Assembly members also participated in the race.

One hundred twenty athletes participated in the marathon while around 7,000 athletes took part in the race. RSS