SILVER AMID FEVER

Prabudass finishes second behind Jordan’s Sharif

KUALA Lumpur Sea Games silver medallist K. Prabudass finished a distant second behind Jordanian Sharif Naim in the 5,000m in the Malaysian Open Athletics championships at the National Stadium yesterday.

But he was all smiles at the finish line, as a knee injury picked up during training at the end of last year forced him to sit out for five months. At the Sea Games, he clocked 14:57.43s.

Sharif won with 14:57.84s while Prabu clocked 15:38.11s and Kuwaiti Kamal Husain (15:40.43s) came in third after running out of steam in the final 50 metres.

“It’s my first race after five months and also, I was down with fever the past two days and had to take medication to run today,” said Prabudass, representing Armed Forces.

“The timing isn’t anywhere near my personal best but I’m satisfied considering the circumstances. I will go to the Philippines next week to compete and hope to clock a better time and try to qualify for the Jakarta Asian Games.”

Nur Fazira Jalaludin of the Armed Forces won the women’s hammer throw with a hurl of 52.75m, ahead of Fatin Nabihan Ibrahim from Perlis (47.33m) and Johor’s Siti Norhamidah Patriee (42.75m).

And it was a profitable day for Forces, as Royson Vincent won the men’s 800m with a time of 1:52.52s, while Savinder Kaur won the women’s 800m by clocking 2:21.09s.

Meanwhile, Jackie Wong Siew Cheer became Malaysia’s undisputed hammer king when he cracked his own national mark for the 12th time since 2013 yesterday.

He threw a distance of 66.01m, to erase his old record of 65m to win the gold.