National track athlete Thiruben Thana Rajan goes full time as he eyes history and medals

SINGAPORE – National middle-distance runner Thiruben Thana Rajan no longer wants to be “just a knife brought to a gunfight”.

Less than a year after he became the first Singaporean to break 1min 50sec in the men’s 800m to eclipse a 38-year-old national record, he has decided to go all in on his track ambitions.

The 25-year-old is hoping to end an even longer drought – a first 800m SEA Games medal since Serjit Singh’s bronze in 1973 – at the 2027 edition in Malaysia.

To achieve his goal, Thiruben, who

clocked his 1:49.94 national mark

in the heats of the Asian Athletics Championships in South Korea last May to wipe off Sinnathambi Pandian’s 1987 record of 1:50.56, feels that he needs to channel all his focus into preparing with full intent.

Hence, he has left his job as a marketing and sponsorships executive at Singapore Athletics (SA), where he has worked since 2023, to become a full-time athlete.

Setting himself an immediate target of qualifying for the 2026 Asian Games, Thiruben said: “At this stage of my life, I know that I need to take the next step to really achieve what, I believe, is my potential.

“I’m not really young any more and I felt now is the time to do it.

“I have enough savings, I have support from the spexPotential programme and some sponsors, so I think it just made sense to me to really commit everything at this point.”

After December’s SEA Games, Singapore National Olympic Council secretary-general Mark Chay had

called for Singapore athletics to “come to the party”

if the Republic wants to finish among the top three nations and pull off a strong showing when it hosts the Games in 2029.

Singapore’s national distance runner Soh Rui Yong

responded to that statement

with a series of social media posts where he defended the performance of Singapore’s track and field team, saying that they are mostly full-time students and working professionals being pitted against full-time athletes.

Using the phrase “don’t bring a knife to a gunfight” as a metaphor, he argued that demanding gold medals while providing inadequate training resources is unrealistic for local athletes.

Thiruben, who struggled with injuries in the lead-up to the 2025 SEA Games in Thailand, finished seventh out of eight with a time of 1:53.70 in the 800m final and was part of the quartet who won the men’s 4x400m relay bronze.

He said a post-Games reflection cemented his decision to go full time.

“As I was reflecting on what I could have done better and how I could have done better, I realised that there were a lot of times when, even though there is flexibility in my work hours, like being able to train twice a day, what you do in between is really important,” said Thiruben, who has planned for training camps and races in Australia and Japan in 2026.

“How you recover is so important.

“And sometimes, even just sitting down at a desk, the mental aspect of working, always having something on your mind, it didn’t really feel I was fully recovering between sessions.”

Going full time has not meant training harder, but training smarter. Thiruben now operates on a 12-day “micro-cycle”, where instead of being confined to a Monday-to-Sunday schedule, he is able to space out high-intensity sessions more effectively.

Every alternate weekend, he takes two days completely off to recover. “It’s a lot closer to how professional athletes actually train,” said Thiruben.

A typical day now starts at about 7am with a main session – either gym work, track intervals or hill training at Bedok Reservoir.

Afterwards, he can fuel up properly, rest and fully recover. If he needs a nap, he takes one. In the evening, he heads out for an easier second session at around 6pm.

“I’m able to put a lot more quality into my hard sessions,” he noted. “I don’t feel that fatigue building up like I used to after two or three weeks.”

Thiruben hopes that his shift to full time will mirror what other Singaporean track athletes like Shanti Pereira and Marc Louis have experienced since the pair went all in on their track careers.

“I used to train with Shanti and she was sharing with me the effect that going full time made,” Thiruben said.

“Most of my competitors around South-east Asia are training full time. If I want to compete for medals around the region, there’s no way around it.”

Besides Thiruben, Singapore’s 100m hurdles record holder Kerstin Ong also recently became a full-time athlete after leaving her job in advertising strategy in late 2025.

SA deputy general manager Bastian Dohling said the national sports association is pleased to see that more athletes are making such moves in their track pursuits.

He added: “We are seeing more athletes recognising that high-performance sport is extremely competitive globally, and that part-time preparation is increasingly difficult if you are targeting Asian and world-level performance. This is a healthy sign for the sport in Singapore.

“It means athletes and stakeholders are aligning around what it really takes to succeed at elite level.”

On Thiruben, Dohling added: “From Singapore Athletics’ perspective, this is a strong and positive step. Moving to full-time training is never an easy decision, but it shows real intent and belief in what is possible at the international level.”

While Thiruben will no longer be crafting social media posts or looking to solicit sponsors for SA, he wants to hone his craft off the track and will look for freelance opportunities which will allow him to write about sports and athletics.

But, for now, the full focus is on writing history for himself and Singapore athletics.