Sreeshankar jumps 8.26m to land in Tokyo

KOCHI: Ask an elite men’s long-jumper as to their ideal jump before an Olympics final and they will likely say ‘anything above 8.25m and I’m likely to be in business’.  That sort of belief is rooted in fact because it will have fetched medals in two of the last five Olympics. In the other three, it will have at least fetched a top five place. Suffice to say it’s a big jump. 

On Tuesday, Murali Sreeshankar leapt 8.26m (Olympic qualifying mark is 8.22m) to punch his way into the Tokyo Games. Still only 21, his mark in Patiala is another reminder as to why he has some hype behind him. What’s more, the 8.26m is a joint world leading jump (South Africa’s Cheswill Johnson and the USA’s Steffin McCarter are the others to have touched that mark in 2021), a mark Indian athletes seldom set, even if it’s a bit early in the season.

So it’s only natural that the Kerala based athlete said ‘it is a big moment for me’. “It is a big moment for me as I will be going to the Olympics which is the dream of any athlete. It is really happening but I was always confident that my hard work will pay off. But this is just a small step and the journey has just started. The target now is to breach the 8.40 mark. I’m confident that I will be able to achieve that going forward,” Sreeshankar told this daily.

It was in his fifth attempt that the Palakkad native secured qualification with his first four jumps being 8.02m, 8.04m, 8.07m and 8.09m respectively. He credited his father S Murali for helping him achieve this feat. “My father who is also my coach has been monitoring my progress throughout and it was he who told me that I can get this done.

It was also a matter of confidence and I’m glad I could manage to get this done. This is only a start, now the hard work comes of preparing and giving a good show at the Olympics. I have to stay focused,” he said. Sreeshankar wants to keep his momentum going and keep improving his own pe­rformances.“The idea is now to stay as close to the Olympic bound jumpers in te­rms of performances. I feel gr­eat and I hope all the hard work put in over the last one and a half years pays off,” he said.