By Tay Jun Wen/Red Sports
Karthic (#1036, extreme left) of HCI led from start to finish to win the A Division individual title in 13:50.39. Heng Yu Jie (#1071) of Raffles Institution was second in 14:16.89 while Bryan Yong (#1073), also of RI, was third in 14:27.66. (Photo © Les Tan/Red Sports)
Bedok Reservoir Park, Wednesday, March 27, 2013 – Karthic Harish Ragupathy of Hwa Chong Institution (HCI) clinched first place in the A Division individual category at the 54th National Schools Cross Country Championships. Karthic also won the individual title 2012.
Karthic is the third person since 1971 to have clinched the championship title in all three divisions after having won the A Division in 2012, the B Division in 2011, and the C Division in 2009.
M. Maran of Assumption English School was the second person to win a hat-trick of titles with his triumphs in 1989, 1987 and 1984 in the A, B and C Divisions respectively.
S. Vasu of Christchurch Secondary did the triple in 1986 with his A Division win, after bagging the B Division title in 1985 and 1984, and the C Division title in 1982.
Karthic finished the 4.3-kilometre route in 13 minutes 50.39 seconds, a slower time than the 13:09.14 he clocked in 2012. Heng Yu Jie of Raffles Institution (RI) was second in 14:16.89 while Yu Jie’s team captain, Bryan Yong Ren Wei was third in 14:27.66.
RI swept the team title with a commanding 15-point total while HCI were second with 31 points. Anglo-Chinese Junior College (ACJC) had 55 points to place third. The positions of the top four runners are added up to get the points total.
Victoria Junior College (VJC) also finished with 55 points but were ranked fourth because their fastest runner, Marcus Ng Yu Pei, finished seventh in 14:48.44, two places behind by ACJC’s fastest runner, Tan Jian Da. Jian Da stopped the clock at 14:38.34.
Karthic said: “It was a good race for me today. I executed it well. I was trying to hit below 14 minutes. My starting today was good. Usually I would start too fast.”
Karthic took the lead early in the race with the RI runners in a pack behind him.
“We decided to let Karthic go at the start of the race. We know that we cannot keep up with his pace. I was eager to follow him but I was patient and picked up my own pace in the last 500 metres,” said Yu Jie.
RI’s captain, Bryan, said: “It seemed possible to catch Karthic. The closest we got to him was about 40 to 50 metres. He pulled away at the last 2km.”
However, Karthic only got quicker and he widened the gap between him and his competitors.
Bryan was proud of his team’s effort.
“My team managed to do quite well as we ran together as a pack.”
“I looked back at the 1km and 3km marks to check and see how far were they (the rest of the pack) away from me. They seemed quite far behind and I was focused on hitting below 14 minutes,” said Karthic.
Justin Tan, VJC’s captain, was disappointed with the result.
“It was disappointing for us. We did not expect this result. We were gunning for first or second place in the team category. Wings Cross Country (where they finished second) showed us that we could have,” said Justin.
Nonetheless, Justin recognised that his team tried their best.
A Division Boys (Top 20)
1st Karthic Harish Ragupathy (#1036, Hwa Chong Institution) — 13:50.39
2nd Heng Yu Jie (#1071, Raffles Institution) — 14:16.89
3rd Yong Ren Wei Bryan (#1073, Raffles Institution) — 14:27.66
4th Tan Hoe En Jonathan (#1075, Raffles institution) — 14:37.29
5th Tan Jian Da (#1004, Anglo-Chinese Junior College) — 14:38.34
6th Lim Jia De (#1074, Raffles Institution) — 14:43.24
7th Marcus Ng Yu Pei (#1103, Victoria Junior College) — 14:48.44
8th Joel Ng Jo-wei (#1037, Hwa Chong Institution) — 14:49.58
9th Benjamin Tang Hao Zhe (#1039, Hwa Chong Institution) — 15:01.29
10th Everest Yeow Qiyue (#1077, Raffles Institution) — 15:02.59
11th Joshua Nga (#1076, Raffles Institution) — 15:03.52
12th Ryan Michael Tan Zhi Xian (#1106, Victoria Junior College) — 15:06.88
13th Tan Yu Chuan (#1035, Hwa Chong Institution) — 15:07.99
14th Kishorwaran S/o Selvaraju (#1002, Anglo-Chinese Junior College) — 15:12.57
15th Ariff Izzudin (#1011, Anglo-Chinese School (Independent)) — 15:14.42
16th Justin Tan Ching Keng (#1104, Victoria Junior College) — 15:15.78
17th Andrew Tay Wei Quan (#1006, Anglo-Chinese Junior College) — 15:16.78
18th Jeremy Lim Tze En (#1010, Anglo-Chinese School (Independent)) — 15:17.31
19th Asher Tham Chi Weng (#1001, Anglo-Chinese Junior College) — 15:22.91
20th Tang Chung Theng (#1109, Victoria Junior College) — 15:30.35
Team Category (Top 4)
1st Raffles Institution — 15 points
2nd Heng Yu Jie
3rd Yong Ren Wei Bryan
4th Tan Hoe En Jonathan
6th Lim Jia De
2nd Hwa Chong Institution — 31 points
1st Karthic Harish Ragupathy
8th Joel Ng Jo-wei
9th Benjamin Tang Hao Zhe
13th Tan Yu Chuan
3rd Anglo-Chinese Junior College — 55 points
5th Tan Jian Da
14th Kishorwaran S/o Selvaraju
17th Andrew Tay Wei Quan
19th Asher Tham Chi Weng
4th Victoria Junior College — 55 points
7th Marcus Ng Yu Pei
12th Ryan Michael Tan Zhi Xian
16th Justin Tan Ching Keng
20th Tang Chung Theng
Complete Individual A Boys Results
More photos next page
[…] across all three divisions at the National Schools Cross Country Championships. Despite finishing runner-up for a second consecutive time in the A Division, Yu Jie’s sterling finishing record over the […]
[…] off his timing from last year, Karthic was the only runner in the field to go under 17 minutes. Karthic recently won his second A Division cross country title at the national schools […]
[…] Since 1971, only three school-athletes have won all three cross-country divisions – A, B and C. Karthic is one of them. Running in the colours of St. Joseph’s Institution, Karthic was the C Division champion in 2009 and picked up the B Division title in 2011. Karthic went on to pursue his studies in Hwa Chong Institution, where he was the A Division champion in both 2012 and 2013. […]