Kumar breaks junior record,in striking distance of senior mark

The lanky 19-year-old from Ortanadu village in Tanjore shattered the previous junior national record which stood at 7.77m to register an improvement of 17 centimeters. The meet record had stood at 7.76 metres. His journey to become one of the most talented juniors has been tough.

When Premkumar was three years old he lost his father while his mother struggled to make both ends meet with her part-time job as a sweeper in a church. However,his mother enrolled him in a government school and it was on the muddy tracks that Premkumar fell in love with sprinting. A local coach spotted the spark in Premkumar and adviced him to join a sports hostel in Chennai.

“Once I moved to Chennai I started training with professional coaches. They encouraged me to be a sprinter as well as a jumper,but now the long jump is my main event,” Premkumar said. .

P Nagarajan,his coach said that Premkumar’s talent lies in his natural technique. “He is able to execute the run-up and move into the jump phase in one smooth motion. He just attacks the take off board without a break in momentum and the control over his jump is absolute. He has rare talent.”

Former national champion,Shyam Kumar,who is Olympian Mayookha Johnny ‘s coach seconds Nagarajan’s claim. “The distance he jumped for the gold is phenomenal. Premkumar definitely has the potential to be a great long-jumper. He had trained with me for a brief while and there is no doubt that he is extremely talented and has the potential to break the senior mark,” Kumar said of his former ward who also owns a Junior Asian Athletics championship bronze medal.