M. RAMACHANDRAN’S HISTORY
TRANSLATION OF M.RAMACHANDRAN’S HISTORY IN ENGLISH by M.GANESAN
M. Ramachandran was born in 9th April 1966 in Panchor, Muar, Johor. His father is Mr.Murusamy A / L Thiruvengadam. His mother is Pn.Muniammal a / p Sinnappa Reddy. He was the seventh of nine siblings. He received his early education in Sekolah Kebangsaan Kota Raja Panchor, Muar and furthered his studies at the Sekolah Menengah Sultan Alauddin Riayat Shah 1 Pagoh, Muar and completed his school life at Maktab Adabi Muar
M. Ramachandran has his own history before he was able to able to champion title and become the first Malaysian athlete to clock in under 30 minutes in the 10,000 meters event. He suffered from asthma since childhood. He cannot take part in sports when he was 7 years old. However, he ignored the threat of the disease and continued to train with persistence and ultimately suffered from asthma for many years has continued to give up and go away by itself. Everything changed when he furthered his studies at the secondary school where one day when he played football on the pitch Tamil National Type Primary School Lanadron Panchor Farm, a teacher watching him running to the upper and lower to catch the ball. The teacher was called Mr. Shahrom bin Suhaimi, who was teaching in Sekolah Menengah Sultan Alaudin Riayat Shah 1 Pagoh.
Mr.Suhaimi bin Shahrom asked Ramachandran to stop playing football and switch to sports. In the beginning, Ramachandran was not keen on forcing himself to sports. But he tried to give particular attention to athletics 400m and 800m. At the age of 15 years he represented his team in a tournament where the school won the 800m. Since then he has stopped playing football and continue his career in the 800m and 1500m events. His success continued in the district and state levels. Ramachandran continued intensive training under the guidance of Mr. Shahrom. As a result, at the age of 16 years Rama has begun to show his prowess by winning three gold medals at school , district and state level by breaking the record.
In 1985, Ramachandran won 3 gold medals in the MSSM in the event 1500m, 5000m 3000m run. Although he was a champion in school, he only ranked fifth in the national athletics championships. Spirit in Rama enabled him to improve his position from fifth place to third in the following year in the same tournament. Rama’s greatness began in 1987 when he won the first gold medal at the national level in the 5000m event in the national athletics championships. Since then, Rama only focus onthe 5000m and 10000m until his retirement in 2001. He was the sole athlete of defending national champions for 15 years in the 5000m and 10000m events.
Ramachandran was elected to represent the National Athletic Championship in Bangkok, Thai Royal Invitation. This is the first tournament he represented the country. He won the bronze medal in the tournament. His record record time was 15:06.95. Rama’s performance continued when he was a member of SWIFT Singapore sports club where he won many competitions in Singapore and that's where he figures to break 15 minutes in 5000m event with a championship record time of 14:57:55 in the sport among the clubs of Singapore. After Ramachandran start working with Maybank in 1987, he was trained under the coach Mr. R. Jeganathan, until his retirement. In 1988 the Athletics championships , Ramachandran won two gold medals and at the same time he also recorded a time of 14:38.61 in the 5000m event at the SEA Games. He was selected to participate in the Kuala Lumpur New Delhi , India
Ramachandran’s greatness was not only in the track event, but he also had control of events such as the 10km and 21km highway in the country since 1990 until 2001. The main success was winning in the highway Terengganu International Bridge Jakarta
Since 1990 till 1992 his performance is not very encouraging despite Ramachandran breaking the national record 3 times in the 5000m event. In the Manila SEA Games Rama only ranked fourth in Kuala Lumpur Australia
Ramachandran performed excellent in Singapore SEA Lion City
Since the 1993 SEA Games, Ramachandran dominated both events until the year 1999 in which overall he has collected eight gold medals and two silver medals at the SEA Games that followed.He is also the first athlete to defend the title of the best distance runners in Southeast Asia for four consecutive times. Ramachandran was elected to represent the World Athletics Championships in Stuttgart, Germany Manila
In 1993, Ramachandran was also awarded with the title Malaysian National Athlete 1993 (Olahragan Malaysia Malaysia which was first introduced by the Olympic Council of Malaysia Johor State
In 2000, he married and announced his retirement to make way for young athletes to take his place but up to now there is no replacement to him at the the national and international levels. He has been blessed with a son and a daughter. His son R.Vikneswaran. His daughter is R. Keertana. Respectively 10 and 7years old. Ramachandran’s wife Pn.S.Chitra encourages him to continue his career as a coach to train young athletes .Hope and confidence is with Ramachandran that his daughter will be a successful athlete like his father in the near future. Any success achieved by Ramachandran is the support given by family members and his employer MAYBANK. Without Maybank Ramachandran certainly can not be successful at international level. His success lies in the hands of his persistence in training. He never left the training in any situation. He always assumes the exercise as real competition. He is assuming that the training as a religious discipline in pursuit of a noble dream to emerge as the conqueror of the long distance champion in Southeast Asia.
Success and excellence Ramachandran ended with the medal and the glory of stars Mangku OF STATE (AMN) and SERVICE MEDAL (PJK).