World Athletics Day
Athletics is a group of sporting events that include competition running, throwing, walking and jumping. World Athletics Day is celebrated annually on May 7. The first celebrations were held in 1996, when Primo Nebiolo, the former President of Worldwide Athletic Federation IAAF, decided to celebrate the day to educate and promote athletics among youth as a primary sport.
Meet top 5 Indian athletes
* Gurbachan Singh Randhawa won a gold medal at the 1962 Asian Games in the decathlon and was the first athlete in India to be felicitated with the Arjuna Award, in 1961.
* Milkha Singh, better known as the Flying Sikh, is the only athlete to win gold in the men's 400mts at the Asian Games as well as the Commonwealth Games. He also won gold at the 1958 and 1962 Asian Games.
* P. T. Usha, better known as the Queen of Indian Track and Field, won five gold medals and one bronze at the 1985 Jakarta Asian Championships and also set an Asian record in the women's 400mt race.
* Anju Bobby George is the first and the only Indian athlete to win a medal in World Championship in Athletics. She won a bronze medal in long jump at the Championships in Paris in 2003. George also received the BBC Lifetime Achievement Award for Best Athlete in India.
* Neeraj Chopra clinched India’s first ever athletics Olympic medal at the Tokyo Olympics 2020. He won the gold in javelin with a throw of 87.58mts.
Did you know?
# The first known person ever to win an athletics event was Korobios - a Greek cook from Elis. He won a 600ft-long stadium race in 776 BC.
# Sprinter Puma Banerjee was India’s first Olympian to be the flag-bearer for the Indian contingent, at the 1920 Summer Olympics in Belgium.
