Sushmita Singha Roy is leading in the heptathlon

Calcutta: Surender Singh, a cross-country runner turned long-distance one, scripted a new Federation Cup record in the 5000m on the opening day of its 13th edition at the Salt Lake Stadium on Thursday. Surendra — representing the Army — clocked 13:51.64 seconds.

Gulab Chand held the previous 5000m mark of the meet when he clocked 14:01.33s in Chennai (July 1998). Surender’s effort, by the way, is best ever registered in India, since Bahadur Prasad made the national record of 13:29.70 seconds in Birmingham (June 1992).

“I never thought of achieving this feat especially with the high humidity here. Had it been in European countries, I would have easily broken the 13.30-mark,” Surender said, giving credit to his coach Ridmal Singh and national coach Dr Nikolai Konstantinovich Snesarev.

The 29-year-old from Garwhal (Uttarakhand) changed tracks to long-distance running in the last edition of the meet (New Delhi) on Ridmal’s insistence.

But success eluded him, as his 30:30 seconds effort in 10,000m earned him the second place. He did not take part in the 5,000m event.

There was a twist in the tale in the inter-state meet, that followed the Federation Cup. Surender struck back-to-back golds in 5000 and 10000m. He carried his momentum on to the Saf Games, Colombo bagging the 10,000m gold. The Doha Asian Games was a reality check for him as he finished a lowly sixth and seventh in 10,000m and 5,000m events, respectively. But a rigorous training at the Army Sports Institute in Pune seemed to have paid off.

But he’s not over yet. His pet event that is 10,000m, Surender says, is on the final day.

Meanwhile, Bengal opened their account through Mallika Mondal who had a third-place finish (1.63 metres) in the women’s high jump.

Mallika incidentally had a same jump as that of Tintu Verghese of Kerala but the latter was adjudged second for lesser number of failures while clearing earlier heights.

Favourite Sushmita Singha Roy was leading in women’s heptathlon with a score of 3307 after 100m hurdles, high jump, shot put and 200m. She topped in all four events.