It was a double whammy for Army Sports Institute (ASI) of Pune runner Gopi T at the Standard Chartered Mumbai Marathon yesterday. The 27-year-old pace-setter for the Indian athletes, for whom this was his first full marathon, not only finished second in the Indian men's full marathon, but also qualified for the Rio Olympic Games. Yesterday he earned a prize money of R5,50,000 (R4,00,000 for coming second plus R1,50,000 bonus for breaking the course record).


Pace-setter T Gopi celebrates winning his second-place finish in the Mumbai Marathon yesterday. Pic/Satej Shinde

Kerala's Gopi finished overall 11th with a timing of 2:16:15 behind ASI's Nitendra Singh Rawat, who came 10th, clocking 2:15:48 and Kheta Ram, also from ASI finishing 15th overall, taking third with 2:17:23. Nitendra and Gopi broke the four-year-old record by Ram Singh Yadav in 2012 of 2:16:59. Gopi said that this was the only opportunity he got and he grabbed it with both hands.