Saving three lives on his mind, 35-year-old athlete from Sirmaur district of Himachal Pradesh Sunil Sharma on Sunday (April 22) broke Asian record of 24-hours treadmill running.
Sharma ran 214.73 km on treadmill in 24 hours on Sunday, breaking the previous record of 202 km set by Brijmohan Sharma.
He had started the run on 21 April at 6.26 pm and the run ended at 6.36 pm on Sunday evening to generate funds to save three the lives of three patients, two suffering from kidney ailments and one from heart disease.
During the 24 hour run, he took 14 breaks, though he faced some difficulty in the end and had to take 6 breaks for physiotherapy.
Though Sharma doesn’t seemed too much enthusiastic about the record as he isn’t yet aware as to how much funds his efforts had generated.
“I will be more satisfied if my efforts had generated enough funds for the treatment of three patients,” he told The Statesman.
He said he had started the run to save the lives of Imran, Surjan Singh and Meena Devi, who are unable to pay for their treatment. He urged the people of the state to come forward and donate funds for the treatment of these patients.
It is worthwhile to mention here that Sunil Sharma, a resident of Maina village in Renuka sub-division of Sirmaur district of HP and he had undertaken such runs in the past too for saving lives of poor patients.
He had started linking his athletic abilities for social causes in 2013 when left exams to arrange blood for a patient while studying in Panjab University, Chandigarh.
He had never looked back or backed down from helping anyone since then.
Earlier, he had undertaken 127 km run from Chandigarh to Renuka to spread awareness on ‘Save Water and Save Forests’ campaign, 250 km run from Chandigarh to Delhi for ‘Beti Bachao Beti Padhao’ campaign and then 150 km charity run for kidney patients in Sirmaur.