National Athletics Championship 2026: Arshad Nadeem in Karachi

By Imran Javed

Published: October 22, 2026  |  Updated: October 22, 2026

The 54th National Athletics Championship gets underway today, Thursday, at the NED University of Engineering & Technology tartan track in Karachi, with Olympic javelin champion Arshad Nadeem headlining a star-studded four-day meet that runs from October 22 to 25. Organised by the Sindh Athletics Association and supervised by the Athletics Federation of Pakistan, the championship is Pakistan’s biggest domestic track and field gathering — and for the first time in years, it arrives with a genuine global headline act.

For local athletics fans, the build-up has felt different this time. Usually the national athletics championship is a quiet departmental affair that ends up buried in the back pages. Not this time. Having an Olympic gold medalist walk out for the javelin — on home soil, in front of Karachi’s athletics community — changes the temperature of the whole event. Expect the NED stands to be fuller than they have been in years.

The headline acts: Arshad, Shajar and Moeed

Let’s start with the name that matters most. Arshad Nadeem is not just the biggest star at this national athletics championship — he is, at this point, the face of Pakistani athletics itself. His 92.97-metre monster throw at the Paris 2024 Olympics rewrote the Olympic record book and gave Pakistan its first Olympic gold in decades. When he steps onto the runway in Karachi, it will be less a competition and more a celebration of what Pakistani athletics can be.

Sharing the spotlight is Shajar Abbas, the national 100-metre record-holder, whose sprinting has given Pakistan something it rarely gets in athletics: genuine speed to cheer about. He is one of the men to watch when the men’s 100m title is decided on the opening day.

The third headline name is Moeed Baloch, Sindh’s own sprinting star. The home crowd always lifts a local boy, and Moeed running on Karachi’s tartan should make the provincial section of the NED stand very loud indeed.

Opening day at a glance

Who is running: the title race and the teams

The departmental heavyweights are back, and the pecking order is clear. Pakistan Army arrives in Karachi as the defending men’s team champion — the green machine’s athletes have dominated the national athletics championship for years with their depth across sprints, middle distance and the field events. On the women’s side, Wapda defend their crown, and their women’s squad has quietly been one of the most consistent units in Pakistani athletics.

Chasing them will be the Higher Education Commission (HEC), Pakistan Air Force, Pakistan Navy, Pakistan Railways and police, alongside provincial squads from Sindh, Punjab, Balochistan, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, Azad Jammu & Kashmir, Islamabad and Gilgit-Baltistan. That spread matters. The national championship works as a scouting ground for the national team — every breakout performance in Karachi lands directly in the Athletics Federation of Pakistan’s selection conversations for future international meets.

The opening ceremony: torch, oath and march-past

The formal inauguration is set for 5pm today, with Sindh Home Minister Zia Hussain Lanjar doing the honours. The ceremony follows the classic championship script that athletes secretly love: a full march-past of the teams, the athletes’ oath, and the arrival of the championship torch.

The VIP list tells you how seriously the federations are taking this edition. Expected at NED are DIG Traffic Syed Pir Muhammad Shah; South Asian Athletics Federation and AFP chairman Maj Gen (retd) Akram Sahi; AFP president Brig (retd) Wajahat Hussain; secretary Col (retd) Shah Jahan Mir; Sindh Culture Minister Syed Zulfiqar Ali Shah; Lok Sahaeta’s head of sports Agha Haroon; and SAA president Mir Ehsan Ali Talpur with secretary Azhar Samadani. When this many federation chairs are in the same stand, the athletes tend to raise their game.

A championship five months late — but worth the wait

Here’s a detail that makes this edition unusual. The 54th national athletics championship was originally scheduled for May 14–17 at the NED Sports Complex — but Karachi’s brutal summer heatwave forced a postponement. Running a four-day track meet in May’s heat would have been unfair to the athletes and dangerous in the longer races.

The delay, it turns out, may have been a blessing. The October window gives the meet a clearer calendar, and the scale remains impressive: roughly 500 athletes and around 200 officials, with some 50 events across men’s, women’s and mixed categories — including crowd-favourite mixed 4x100m and 4x400m relays.

For context, Pakistan’s sporting calendar has been unusually busy lately — from Pakistan climbing past Australia in the ICC ODI rankings to Pakistan hosting its first Billie Jean King Cup women’s tennis tie — and the national athletics championship lands right in the middle of that momentum.

What to watch on day one

Seven gold medals will be decided on the opening day, and the sprint double headlines them. The men’s and women’s 100m finals — with Shajar Abbas in the men’s race — are the races the Karachi crowd will come for. A fast time on the NED tartan would set the tone for the whole championship and could fast-track selection for Pakistan’s next international assignments.

Why this championship actually matters

Pakistan’s athletics pipeline is thin, and the national championship is the single biggest shop window young athletes get. Coaches from the departments take their notes here. The AFP takes its selection hints here. And every few years, someone breaks through here and ends up on a plane to an Asian championship or a Commonwealth Games. Watching Arshad throw, up close, in Karachi: that is not just sport — it is a recruitment campaign for Pakistani athletics.

Frequently asked questions

TimelyUps will track the medal table, records and standout performances from the 54th National Athletics Championship across all four days from Karachi.