Sanath Bandara misses world record again

Sanath Bandara of SL Navy failed yet another time to break the Guinness World Record for running the longest distance on a treadmill for 24 hours at a stretch. The current world record feat stands at 257kms. Bandara who started his record breaking run on Friday (27) at 3.33pm only managed 210kms and 650m at the end of his 24 hour run, made at Olympic House in Colombo, yesterday.

A seaman by profession, Bandara, tried to break the record last year too at the Sugathadasa Stadium but missed out by a thin margin, He completed 251kms and 550m in his first attempt last year. After he missed the world record by a short margin on his first attempt, everyone expected Bandara to go pass the world record on Saturday in his second attempt.

The current world record stands as 257kms and 880m set by Suresh Joachim, a Sri Lankan living in Australia, in 2004. Joachim has attempted to set 33 world records including the longest run on a tread mill on a day.

Yesterday, Bandara started well and completed over 37kms in the first three hours but he couldn’t continue in the same vein before going down fighting.

Bandara is ranked among the top five marathon runners in Sri Lanka and with scarce facilities that Sri Lankan marathon runners have nowadays, the mere attempting to set a world could be regarded as nothing less than breaking a world record. If Bandara continues in this way, he will probably be able to bring honour to his motherland one day.

The sponsors of Bandara for the above effort to set a Guinness World Record were Sri Lanka Red course, Techno Gym, Rough T-shirt, Piyasena Private Company, Metatechno Lanka & Tanro and Adidas.