Madumali, Pushpakumara win 30 km road race

By Reemus Fernando

Many time national steeplechase winner R.M.S. Pushpakumara (Samantha Pushpakumara) and Navy’s Madumali Perera won the men’s and women’s 30 kilo metres road race conducted by Sri Lak Athletics Club in Colombo on Sunday.

Pushpakumara who gave up his pet event, the steeplechase to concentrate on longer track events and road races won the 30 km race in a time of one hour, 42 minutes and seven seconds. The Army athlete who turned 40 in March edged out Thala Warige Rathnapala by just 16 seconds to win.

Pushpakumara who won nine consecutive steeplechase national titles from 2011 took up the road races couple of years ago. With the road race title against his name now he could be the first choice of national selectors to represent Sri Lanka at international marathons in 2024.

Sri Lanka Athletics announced that the road race held on Sunday would be the selection race for three international marathons which will be held in 2024.

In the women’s category Navy’s Madumali Perera returned an impressive time of one hour, 56 minutes and 59 seconds to win. She was the only athlete to clock sub two hours to finish the grueling event. Army’s Wathsala Herath and Air Force runner Nilanthi Lanka finished second and third respectively. While Herath returned a time of 2:1.15 seconds, Ariyadasa clocked 2:02.53 seconds.

With her victory, Perera has reiterated that she is the athlete to beat and is in good shape to improve on her personal best when she competes at international level. She won the silver medal when she competed in Bangladesh early this year.

Sri Lanka Athletics is set to pick teams for three international marathons taking place in 2024. They are the Hanoi Marathon in Vietnam, Bangabandu Marathon in Bangladesh and Asian Marathon Championship in Hong Kong.