The 2023 IAU 50KM World Championships was declared open by Adille Sumariwalla, president, Athletics Federation of India (AFI), in Hyderabad on Saturday, November 4. The race to decide the individual winners and winning teams will be held on Sunday.

This is the first time India is hosting an ultrarunning world championships. Over 150 athletes from 22 countries have arrived for the championships, a related official press release said. According to it, there are three categories of events – elite athletes representing the sports federation of each country, masters from World Masters Athletics and the open category, where participants register as individuals. This is the fourth edition of the 50 km world championships. The first and second editions were held in Doha (2015 and 2016) and the third in Romania in 2019.

The countries participating at the event in Hyderabad include USA, Germany, Spain, South Africa, Croatia, Japan, Australia, Great Britain, Bosnia-Herzegovina, Czech Republic, Poland, Denmark, Ireland, Estonia, Mongolia, Norway, Lithuania, Jordan, Canada and India.

“ Its amazing to see how the sport is growing in India,’’ Nadeem Khan, president, International Association of Ultrarunners (IAU), said, referring to the two IAU continental championships (24 hours and 100 km) and now an IAU world championship (50 km) being held in the country. Besides India playing host for the earlier mentioned continental championships, Indians teams had also secured a place on the podium. This is in addition to the podium positions Indians earned at the 2019 edition of the 100 km continental championships in Jordan.

The 50 km discipline is the shortest of ultramarathon’s races. The discipline is being positioned as a candidate for potential inclusion in the Olympic Games (with advantage currently seen in its trail version thanks to the scenic beauty of trail locations as compared to the setting of a road race). Participants for the 50 km race are usually drawn from the ranks of marathoners just outside the lot constituting the truly elite category of marathon runners.

The really fast marathon runners, who are focused on that discipline, may not wish to try the 50 km race as they wouldn’t want to upset the speed and pacing, they are already used to and improving upon. However, for those who are a notch below, the 50 km race represents an interesting proposition.      

The Indian team for the 50 km world championships include Bangriya Vikram Bharatsinh (2:18:00 – personal best in the marathon), Anish Thapa Magar (2:17:00), Mohit Rathor (2:18:00), Prahlad Dhanavat (2:20:00), Akshay Saini (2:24:02), Arjun Pradhan (2:20:00), Jyoti Gawate (2:53:00), Ashvini Madan Jadhav (2:53:00), Kavitha Reddy (3:05:00) and Prachi Raju Godbole (3:50:09 – personal best in 50 km).

At a media interaction prior to the opening ceremony, some of the foreign athletes said that notwithstanding their training and preparations for the championships, those hailing from countries with colder weather than Hyderabad’s may find the conditions in the city challenging. On the whole, the mood seemed upbeat with athletes looking forward to the race. As stated at the media interaction, the fastest male runner coming into the competition was Abdulaziz Mahammedsalih Ebrahim representing Norway while the fastest among women was Andrea Pomaranski of the US. As per details available on his profile at World Athletics, Ebrahim has a personal best of 2:15:03 in the marathon.

Speaking to this blog, Andrea said that for a runner participating in the 50 km race, the last eight kilometres marking the difference between a marathon (42 km) and the 50 km ultramarathon, are felt as intensely as the final stages of a marathon. She runs the 50 km race pretty much like a marathon and “ tries to hang in there’’ as the race enters its final stage. She said that typically for a 50 km race, she manages her splits at a pace that is slightly slower than for the marathon and then tries to sustain it. Andrea has a personal best of around three hours and seven minutes for the 50 km race and 2:31:06 for the marathon.   

(The authors, Latha Venkatraman and Shyam G Menon, are independent journalists based in Mumbai)