Indian military men ready for pentathlon challenge

Indian military men have proved their mettle on the battlefield, and now they are readying themselves for a new challenge called pentathlon, that they will be facing on the playground.

By Vikram Vishal

Hyderabad, July 9 : Indian military men have proved their mettle on the battlefield, and now they are readying themselves for a new challenge called pentathlon, that they will be facing on the playground.

Come October, Indian soldiers will for the first time participate in military pentathlon at the Fourth World Military Games to be held in the twin city of Hyderabad-Secunderabad from 14 to 21 of that month.

It will also be the first time that India will be hosting this military specific sport, which is being played since 1950.

Out of the 13 sporting events to be played at the fourth edition of the games, three are military sports, namely pentathlon, parachuting and shooting. Indian military men have experiences of participating in the latter two games, and now they are set to make their debut in the former also.

Generally, both men and women athlete participate in pentathlon, but in the World Military Games only men will participate from India.

Colonel K J Singh of Artillery Division is hopeful of a good performance by India at the games. He said that Indian pentathletes are preparing very hard to leave a mark among their relatively experienced competitors.

"One hundred fifty-six men and 53 women from 30 countries have confirmed their participation in this event," Colonel Singh said, adding that China had dominated in this discipline at the last games played at Catania in Italy in 2003.

Military pentathlon consists of five events; shooting with standard rifle (200 meters), obstacle run (500 meters) with 20 obstacles, obstacle swimming (50 meters) with four obstacles, throwing with standardised projectiles (one precision and one distance test), and cross-country run.

Each team has 10 members (six men and four women) and the one that scores highest aggregate points emerges as the winner.

The sport is called military pentathlon because its five disciplines "complete military training," Colonel Singh added.

A total of 13 disciplines will be held at the games, which is being termed as the second biggest after the Olympic Games. Hockey and kabaddi have been scrapped due to "lack of participation". However, these two sports will be organised as exhibition sports along with Polo.

Out of 127 members of the Conseil International du Sport Militaire (CISM), better known as International Military Sports Council, 78 countries have confirmed their participation, and around 5100 sportsmen are going to participate in this year's games.

ANI