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| Sunday, 16 January 2005 |
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Mahamaya has gained much from Thamara's experience by Upananda Jayasundera - Kandy Sports Special Corr. Thamara Padmini Wickremasinghe is a physical training teacher attached to Mahamaya Girls' College, Kandy and the school could have not have thought of a better person to be their athletic coach, as Thamara has been a formidable athlete during her younger days. She won the first women's marathon race in 1982, recording a timing of 3 hours 21 minutes for the 26-mile 385 yards distance and she also represented Sri Lanka in the singapore Marathon in 1985. On the track, she won the 800 metres and 1,500-metre races for three consecutive years at the National Games and to cap it all, she was awarded the best performance award for women in all three years. That was not all. Thamara won the 1,500, 3,000 and 5,000 metres events representing Sri Lanka in the 35 year age-group at the Veterans Athletic Meet held in Malaysia in 1997 and in Japan in 1998. So, it has been her in-built talent that kept her going during her competition days as there were no training facilities at her school Alawwa Central. So, with the knowledge gained during her school days, Thamara didn't let it drip away when she finished her schooling and she was able to bring out champions when she took to coaching. In charge of athletic coaching at Mahamaya Girls' School, the school emerged champions at the Central Province Athletic Championships from 1992 to 2000. Then there were individual athletes who gained much from Thamara's coaching, Herath - an old girl of Mahamaya, was a member of the Sri Lanka women's 4x400 metres relay team that participated in the Olympic Games in 2000. Then there was Shalika Ranasinghe who also represented Sri Lanka at international meets. Besides athletics, Thamara seems to have cultivated an interest in cricket too and is in charge of Mahamaya Girls' cricket team and the girls who are very keen on cricket, hope to excel in that sport too. |
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