Basanta Bahadur Rana

Sepoy Basanta Bahadur Rana (born 18 January 1984 in Chamkipur, Nepal) is a Nepali-Indian athlete who competes in racewalking. He represented India in the 50 km race walk event at the 2012 Summer Olympics in London. His personal best in this event before the Games was 4:02:13 and he bettered it by clocking a time of 3:56:48, a new national record.

2012 Summer Olympics

Basanta qualified for the Olympics at the 2012 IAAF World Race Walking Cup in Saransk, Russia in May 2012, with a B qualifying standard. He was trained by the former national record holder Gurdev Singh. In the 1960 Olympics at Rome, Zora Singh was 8th clocking 4:37:44.6s.

Basanta finished 36th in the event by setting a new national record of 3:56:48. By setting this record, Basanta broke the previous national record of 4:16:22 clocked by his mentor Gurdev Singh who had set it in Hyderabad in 2005.

Personal life

Basanta is from a hamlet, located 12 hours north of Kathmandu. He joined the Indian army in 2002 and is currently serving at the Gorkha Regiment. Basanta is supported by Anglian Medal Hunt Company.