Sriram Singh

Sriram Singh

Sriram Singh Shekhawat (born 14 November 1948 in Badnagar, Rajasthan) was an Indian middle distance runner.

Sriram Singh joined Rajputana Rifles in 1968 where he came under the influence of the coach Ilyas Babar. Babar persuaded him to shift his focus from 400m to 800m.

In the 1970 Asian Games in Bangkok, he was beaten to the second place in the 800 by Jimmy Crampton of Burma. Singh went out in the heats in the Munich Olympics in 1972 but his time of 1:47.7 bettered Crampton's Asian record. He improved it to 1:47.6 while winning the gold in the Teheran Asian Games of 1974.

The high point of Sriram Singh's career was the 800m race in 1976 Montreal Olympics. Prior to the competition he had never run on synthetic tracks. The qualifying round, the semifinal and the final were run on successive days. In the first race, he broke his own Asian record with a time of 1:45.94. In the semifinal, he came second in a time of 1:46.40.

In the final, Singh led at the bell with a time of 50.85 ahead of Cuban Alberto Juantorena's 50.90. Juantorena caught up with him around the 550m mark and won in a world record time of 1:43.50. Singh faded away in the home straight to finish seventh with a time of 1:45.77. Juantorena later attributed his world record to Sriram's front running.

Sriram Singh's time stood as an Asian record till 1994 and as of 2011 is still the Indian national record. He retained his 800m gold medal in the 1978 Asian Games (1:48.80), but was eliminated in the heats of the same event in the Moscow Olympics.