Wonder Girl Mayumi to bring laurels for the country

Leslie FERNANDO

Mayumi Raheem currently the most promising female swimmer of the country has brought and continue to bring honour to Sri Lanka is presently studying and swimming in Singapore.

She is training at the Singapore Swimming Club, Singapore and hoping to swim at the FINA World Championships in Rome, Italy from July 18 to August 2 and also to compete at the Asian Age Group Swimming Championship in Tokyo, Japan August 9 to 13, 3rd Asian Indoor Games in Vietnam, October 5 to 12 and the forthcoming 11th South Asian Games to be held in Dhaka, Bangladesh. 'Wonder Girl' Mayumi who captured the hearts of swimming fans at the 2006 South Asian Games in Colombo had a total of ten medals (3 gold medals, 3 silver medals and 4 bronze medals).

Mayumi who has represented Sri Lanka at the Commonwealth Games 2005 FINA Short Course Swimming Championships held in China 2006, Asian Games in Qatar 2007 and the 2008 Beijing Olympics was born on September 15 1991 is a Sri Lankan national and currently lives in Singapore and attends the United World College of South East Asia (UWCSEA). She has previously lived in Sir Lanka and New Zealand. She was a member of Singapore Swimming Club from 2004 until 2007 when her Australian coach Jaan Murphy whom she publicly attributed much of her success too returned to Australia. She then swam for Swim Fast Aquatic under former Singaporean National record holder David Lim before moving the Grassroot Club under American coach Jack Simon. She did well at school and took her IGCSE Mathe (Accelerated) Examination.

Swimming career

Mayumi began swimming at the age of 8 and has been swimming ever since. She is an international swimmer and captained Sri Lanka's national Swimming team to the Asian Games in Doha, Qatar.

She is an accomplished swimmer who has won gold medals for the women's 50,100,200 metres breast stroke at the 2006 South Asian Games. For these games she also won 5 silvers and 3 bronze medals, a record for any athlete at a single game. She also won a bronze medal for breast stroke at the Singapore leg of the Swimming World Cup. She also contested a semi-final in the women's 50 metres breast stroke at the 2005 Commonwealth Games in Melbourne, Australia and has represented Sri Lanka at the 2005 World Championship and the 2006 World Short Course Championships and the Beijing Olympic Games 2008. She also holds numerous Sri Lanka national records. In 2006 she placed second at the Singapore National Open Championships behind a US-Based Singaporean athlete to become the fastest women over the 200 metres breast stroke based in Singapore she was coached to the aforementioned accomplishments by Australian coach Jaan Murphy at Singapore Swimming Club from 2004 to 2007 until his return to Australia. Mayumi Raheem the Aqua Queen of Sri Lanka swimming achieved another first in her life. She was awarded the Colours with distinction for swimming, the best swimmer of the year 2007/2008 and the Sports Girl of the year 2007-2008 by her school, United World College of Singapore. These awards were given at the 16th Annual Sports Colours Award Ceremony held at the main auditorium on April 25 at the school. Mayumi has won Colours and Distinction for swimming since she joined UWC in 2001 and the swimmer of the Year award for three continuous years.