NEW DELHI: Gulveer Singh ended 2024 on the best possible note by setting a new national record in the men's 10,000m event at the Hachioji Long Distance 2024 athletics meet in Japan last week in a chart topping display.
The previous record had also stood in Gulveer's name but his new mark of 27:14.88s was almost 27 seconds better than his previous best of 27:41.81, which had also come earlier this year and broken Surendra Singh's longstanding record, which had stood since 2008.
Gulveer credited his AFI coach Scott Simmons and Army coach Yunis Khan for helping him overcome the disappointment of missing out on qualifying for the Olympics and bouncing back strongly.
Gulveer, who now holds the national record in both the long distance events of 5,000m and 10,000m said, "A lot of credit has to go to my AFI coach Scott Simmons, who helped me plan my whole schedule and gave me very clear guidelines during practice sessions. Coach Yunis makes sure I train right. Whatever I have achieved is because of the support of the Athletics Federation of India, Army, Reliance Foundation and the guidance of my coaches. A person can't achieve these things singularly, it's the whole team working with me that has pushed me."
"Scott Sir, who is from the US, has worked a lot with me on having a winning mindset and also made some tweaks in my training regime and that is what I follow very strictly. I can see the impact of those things already in my improved performances and faster timings," he added.
Gulveer also adds that training in the US as part of an initiative by the AFI helped fast track his development as he got the opportunity to train with Olympic medalists there and they pushed him to work even harder as he was in the same training group as them.
