Thonnakkal Gopi Profile: Men’s Marathon

Thonnakkal Gopi had finished 11th in the recently concluded Mumbai marathon.

Thonnakkal Gopi, 28: Thonnakkal Gopi made it to the Rio Olympics along with Kheta Ram. He took 2:16:15 hours in the Mumbai Marathon to qualify for Rio 2016 Olympics. He finished 11th in the marathon event. T Gopi, who came with his training partners for the Standard Chartered Mumbai Marathon 2016 to boost their timings,  was actually asked to be the pace-setter for faster distance runners eyeing Olympic qualification at Rio. His journey to Rio turned out to be quite amazing after that. He might not have event dreamt of qualifying for an Olympics event had he not started training with the Army personnel. He started off by training with the Army Sports Institute members (ASI) and continued to be part of the runners group. He eventually realised that he could take his focus to another level by competing against high profile athletes. Soon, he began training with the top athletes. But the crucial, rather life changing, moment came when he started doing better than most of the International level players. He finally sealed his berth for the Rio Olympics and will now compete at the international level.

Event- Marathon (Men’s)

Qualifying event – Mumbai Marathon 2016

Event Date- August 21

Record- Personal best of 2 hour 16 minutes and 15 seconds.

Career Highlights – His role was that of the support staff with the Army Sports Institute (ASI) group of runners.