MUMBAI: It's difficult to look beyond the specialists from African countries, Kenya and Ethiopia, while predicting the overall men's and women's champions in tomorrow's USD 405,000 Tata Mumbai Marathon.
However, the home country's runners have also set their own agenda while trying to beat the rest of their compatriots.
Men's course record holder, Nitendra Singh Rawat said today he was aiming to better his own mark of 2016 when going one-on-one against Gopi Thonakal, who became the first ever male from the country to win the Asian championship title last November in China.
"I want to create my own new course record. I have been training in Ooty, at a height of 2300 metres, for the last one month and am targeting the 2 hours, 13 minutes mark," said Rawat who clocked an impressive 2:15:18 when winning the marathon at the last SAF Games.
Gopi, for his part, said he was also aiming for the 2:13 mark and according to the duo the Athletics Federation of India has issued guidelines that 2:12:50 would be the mark that would be considered for selection for the April Commonwealth Games in Gold Coast, Australia.
"I have been training in Bengaluru for three months and my victory in the Asian marathon has given me confidence.
I want to clock 2:13," said Gopi, also from the Indian Army like his main rival, Rawat.
Rawat and Gopi both made it to the Rio Olympic Games of 2016 with the former edging out the latter in the 2016 race here. While Gopi performed in impressive fashion clocking 2:15:25 in Rio, a hamstring injury affected Rawat's performance in Brazil.
These two are the hot favourites to finish as the fastest among Indians in tomorrow's race for the elite foreign and Indian athletes although there are others like Srinu Bughatha and A B Balliappa who can create an upset from among the 19 Indian men participants in the full marathon race.
Top woman steeplechaser Sudha Singh is among the women runners aiming to end up as the fastest among Indian participants along with last year's best home country finisher – Jyoti Gawte.
Sudha, who won the Asian Games steeplechase gold in 2010 at Guangzhou, said although she was running in the marathon tomorrow her aim was to dip under the steeplechase qualifying mark of 9:40 set by AFI for the CWG in April.
She also praised the organisers for arranging the winner of the inaugural Mumbai Marathon in 2004, Hendrick Ramaala of South Africa, as the pace setter for the Indian women.
"This is for the first time anyone has arranged a pace setter for us. I thank the organisers. My target is 2:33. I have been preparing for the race in Dharamsala and then Bengaluru," said Sudha who clocked 2:39:28 in 2016 before taking part in the Rio Games steeplechase event.
"I will concentrate on qualifying for steeplechase in the CWG and am aiming for 9:15," added Sudha, a seven-time national champion in the 3000m SC and winner of the same event in the Asian Championship in Bhubaneshwar last year.
She will have to contend with Jyoti, who finished first among the Indian women in last year's race here clocking 2:50:53 and experienced runner Monika Raut.
A total of 17 Indian women are to take part in the full marathon.
The best Indian men and women runners take home Rs 5 lakh and the promoters, Procam International, have offered a bonus of Rs 2 lakh for breaking the course record.
The top prize for the menÂ’s and womenÂ’s champions is USD 42,000 and a bonus of USD 15,000 is on offer for breaking the course record.
A total of 18 men and 12 women elite foreign runners, mostly from Africa and Ethiopia, will be gunning for the top prize.
Ethiopian Solomon Deksisa, last yearÂ’s Tokyo Marathon winner, and KenyaÂ’s Joshua Kipkorir, runner-up here in 2017, appear to be the frontrunners among men.
Among elite foreign women, KenyaÂ’s defending champion Bornes Kitur and 2017 Ljubljana Marathon winner Shoko Genemo of Ethiopia are among the favourites for the overall top prize.