Gurindervir Singh created a new national record, with a timing of 10.09 seconds in the 100m race at the Federation Cup to become India’s fastest man. (Reliance Foundation)With his fellow teammates and players becoming DSPs while also representing India during their careers, Kamaljit Singh, a constable with the Punjab Police, had only one dream — to make his youngest son a sprinter.After Singh Sr suffered a career-ending wrist injury, the Punjab Police employee began taking a young Gurindervir to the ground in Patial village near Jalandhar before enrolling him under coach and former CRPF athlete Swaran Singh in the nearby village of Dalla. As his 25-year-old son created a new national record, with a timing of 10.09 seconds in the 100m race at the Federation Cup to become India’s fastest man, Kamaljit and his wife visited the gurdwara in their village.“When I first took Gurindervir to the ground, he was very quick during the laps, and that is when I took him to coach Swaran Singh. Around that time, I would also tell him about Usain Bolt winning his first Olympic gold in 2008, and Gurindervir would say, I will also run fast. To see him create a new national record and become India’s fastest man is the reward for all the hard work,” Kamaljit told The Indian Express. Gurindervir Singh with coach James Hillier. (Express Photo | Pritish Raj)With Gurindervir initially training under coach Swaran Singh, his father soon realised that his son needed to move to nearby Jalandhar for better facilities. After six years, the Punjab Police constable decided to send Gurindervir to PIS Jalandhar to train under coach Sarabjeet Singh Happy. At the time, Singh Sr was posted in Bhogpur and worked night shifts, which meant travelling to Jalandhar during the day.“I knew that Gurindervir had to leave the village. I would finish my night duty at the Bhogpur police station, prepare food for him — including chicken and salads — and carry the tiffin to Jalandhar every day for more than six years. When he broke the U20 national record during his youth career, there were also years when he suffered from an upset stomach. We consulted doctors across Punjab, but there was no cure. He would feel dejected because his body was failing him. Then he saw a video about stomach worms, and a Rs 10 medicine from a local chemist cured him. That phase made him mentally stronger, too,” the father recalled.Moving to Jalandhar also allowed Gurindervir to train at the athletics track at PIS. Coach Sarabjeet Singh Happy still remembers the first day he met the sprinter.“His legs were very strong, and his short sprinting ability stood out immediately. Back then, many athletes used to say that Punjabis could not run the 100m. Gurindervir would respond by saying he would prove them wrong. We stopped his weight training and focused instead on explosiveness through regular bounding, hopping, and stretching drills. Soon, he was clocking 11 to 11.10 seconds,” the coach recalled.Story continues below this adAlso Read | 10.26 to 10.09: How Indian sprinters are shattering long-standing barriersIn 2017, Singh won the title at the Asian U18 Championships in Thailand with a time of 10.69 seconds. The Punjab sprinter then dipped below 10.50 seconds with a 10.47-second run at the U20 Nationals in Coimbatore the following year, before recording his personal best of 10.27 seconds in 2021. However, for the next three years, the sprinter was unable to go below 10.30 seconds. Happy spoke about the difficult period in Singh’s career.“We often faced problems during training. During the COVID years, we trained in parks and sometimes rented a hotel in Patiala for a couple of days just so we could train properly. The stomach issues, along with tonsil problems, occupied much of his mind, but he remained very resilient through that phase,” Happy said.Nitin Sharma is an Assistant Editor with the sports team of The Indian Express. Based out of Chandigarh, Nitin works with the print sports desk while also breaking news stories for the online sports team. A Ramnath Goenka Excellence in Journalism Award recipient for the year 2017 for his story ‘Harmans of Moga’, Nitin has also been a three-time recipient of the UNFPA-supported Laadli Media Awards for Gender Sensitivity for the years 2022, 2023 and 2024 respectively. His latest Laadli Award, in November 2025, came for an article on Deepthi Jeevanji, who won India’s first gold medal at the World Athletics Para Championship and was taunted for her unusual features as a child. Nitin mainly covers Olympics sports disciplines with his main interests in shooting, boxing, wrestling, athletics and much more. The last 17 years with The Indian Express has seen him unearthing stories across India from as far as Andaman and Nicobar to the North East. Nitin also covers cricket apart from women’s cricket with a keen interest. Nitin has covered events like the 2010 Commonwealth Games, the 2011 ODI World Cup, 2016 T20 World Cup and the 2017 AIBA World Youth Boxing Championships. An alumnus of School of Communication Studies, Panjab University, from where he completed his Masters in Mass Communications degree, Nitin has been an avid quizzer too. A Guru Nanak Dev University Colour holder, Nitin’s interest in quizzing began in the town of Talwara Township, a small town near the Punjab-Himachal Pradesh border. When not reporting, Nitin's interests lie in discovering new treks in the mountains or spending time near the river Beas at his hometown. ... Read More © The Indian Express Pvt LtdTags:Federation Cup