National Sports Council (NSC) director-general Jefri Ngadirin (main image), is open to more cooperation with Germany after a successful three-week training stint for a 50-strong German contingent in Malaysia.
The athletes are preparing for this weekend’s World Athletics Relays in Guangzhou, China – a qualifying event for the World Championships in Tokyo, Japan, from Sept 13-21. The training stint was made possible with the help of Malaysian Athletics vice-president and coaching chairman Datuk Mark Ling.
“Our strong relationship with Germany spans nearly 30 years. The training stints there benefited our Malaysian athletes, and many national records set during that time still stand,” said Jefri.
“It would be good if we could resume that connection. We had discussions over dinner with the German team, and it was well received.
“So, it is something we are looking at doing. While there was no formal agreement last time, the collaboration worked out well for our athletes.”
Among the former athletes who benefited from training in Germany were Noraseela Khalid (400m hurdles), Moh Siew Wei (100m hurdles), Malik Tobias (decathlon), Zaiful Zainal Abidin (400m), and Nauraj Singh (high jump).
Noraseela’s national record of 56.02s, set in Regensburg, Germany, on June 17, 2006, and Moh’s record of 13.27s, set on June 11, 2004, in Regensburg, remain unbroken.
Malik’s decathlon record of 7,095 points, set at Filderstadt, Germany, on June 7 and 8, 2003, also still stands, while Nauraj’s high jump record of 2.30m, set at the 2017 Singapore Open, is still unchallenged.
Zaiful’s time of 46.41s, set on July 20, 2001, in Brunei, was only broken by Umar Osman at the 2023 SEA Games (46.34s). Umar has since lowered the time to 46.09s.
Meanwhile, Youth and Sports Minister Hannah Yeoh said she hopes more countries will use Malaysia as a base to train and prepare for events in this region.
“Malaysia is strategically located for teams to stop by to train for an Asian championship,” said Yeoh.
“We have excellent facilities, even in the private sector, as we have seen with the German contingent, who were based at Alice Smith (International School in Kuala Lumpur). I hope other countries can see how happy the German team was to train in Malaysia for the past three weeks and follow their lead.”
Among the German athletes who participated in the camp were the bronze medal-winning members of the women’s 4x100m relay team from the Paris Olympic Games – Sophia Junk, Lisa Mayer and Rebekka Haase – and the men’s 4x100m and 4x400m relay teams, who earned bronze at the European Championships in Rome last year.
