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Sports

Wednesday September 2, 2009

Lingering knee pain forces Sin Mei to quit

By AFTAR SINGH

KUALA LUMPUR: Pain in the knees lingers on for triple jumper Ngew Sin Mei. And she has decided to quit athletics.

The Kuala Lumpur lass has been out of competition since winning the silver medal at the Korat SEA Games in December, 2007. And she underwent rehabilitation since January last year.

The 26-year-old Sin Mei was back in training last month to make a bid to qualify for the Laos Games in December.

Calling it a day: Ngew Sin Mei has had enough of athletics.

“Each time I landed on the pit, I felt pain in both my knees. I don’t seem to be able to recover fully from these injuries and I have decided to quit for good,’’ she said.

Injuries have bugged Sin Mei several times.

She suffered an ankle injury at the 2005 Manila SEA Games and had to skip the 2006 Melbourne Commonwealth Games. She aggravated the injury in the 2006 Doha Asian Games and was sidelined for five months.

Sin Mei, who is now working as a fitness instructor, added that she would not get to fulfil her dream to compete in the 2012 London Olympics.

“I am really sad that my athletics career has to end this way. I also feel sad that there are no other athletes to replace me in the triple and long jump events for the Laos Games,” said Sin Mei, who was the most successful Malaysian female athlete in those events in recent years.

She holds the national triple jump and long jump records of 13.74m and 6.27m respectively.

Sin Mei made her SEA Games debut in Hanoi in 2003 and won the triple jump silver medal. At the next Games in Manila, she broke the meet record with a leap of 13.61m, erasing the previous mark of 13.49m. She posted 13.73 for the silver in Korat and Thailand’s Thitima Muangjan broke the Games record with a 13.85m effort.

In the long jump, Sin Mei was the bronze medallist at the Manila and Korat Games.

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