Major General VD Dogra completed an exhausting ‘Ironman’ competition held in Austria on Sunday. After achieving this feat, he has become the first serving Indian Army officer and the only General across the world to have completed this competition.

The ‘Ironman’ is an international competition which consists of three consecutive events which include 3.8 km of swimming, 180 km cycling and 42.2 km of running. It is regarded as the toughest one-day sporting event in the world. The participants need to complete its all three events within 17 hours. Only after completing the event within the required timeframe, participants can earn the title of ‘Ironman’. The general-rank army officer completed the event in 14 hours and 21 minutes.

The Ironman competition was held in Austria’s Klagenfurt on July 1. More than 3000 athletes participated in the event. "He is the only serving army officer from the Indian Army to have done a full Ironman and the only General across the globe to have done so," reported The Times of India quoting  Indian Army spokesperson Col. Aman Anand as saying.

Maj Gen Dogra, is currently posted as Director General Resettlement. He has also commanded an Armoured Brigade on the western front with Pakistan and an Infantry Division in a Strike Corps. The Sword of Honour and Gold Medalist winner of the December 1981 batch got commissioned into the Poona Horse Regiment. He was also Commanding Officer of the regiment.

The officer cycled from Leh to Chandigarh in 8 days. According to a report published in Economic Times, He has also cycled from Jodhpur to Jaisalmer, Sela Pass to Bumla Pass in Arunachal Pradesh and from Akhnoor to Rajouri in Jammu and Kashmir. He also participated in various triathlons before participating in this event.

(The above story first appeared on LatestLY on Jul 03, 2018 04:23 PM IST. For more news and updates on politics, world, sports, entertainment and lifestyle, log on to our website latestly.com).