KUALA LUMPUR, April 23 — Youth and Sports Minister, Syed Saddiq Syed Abdul Rahman today hailed athlete Muhammad Azeem Mohd Fahmi as ‘Malaysia’s very own Usain Bolt’ after the teenage sprint sensation ran 100m in 10.63 seconds.
The 15-year-old surpassed his personal best record by 0.06 seconds when he competed at the Malaysia Schools Sports Council (MSSM) athletics championships in Iskandar Puteri, Johor yesterday.
Muhammad Azeem's new personal best saw him win nationwide praise, with social media users calling him a future world champion and urging the nation’s governing sports body not to waste his talents.
“Malaysia’s very own Usain Bolt,’’ said Syed Saddiq in a tweet, referring to Jamaican sprint star Usain Bolt who won the gold medal in the 100m, 200 and the 4x100m at the Beijing Olympics and then went on to repeat the feat in London in 2012 and again in Rio in 2016.
“We have to ensure that his talent is not wasted,’’ said Syed Saddiq, while tagging the National Sports Institute and the National Sports Council in his tweet.
In the MSSM track meet, Muhammad Azeem stayed ahead of the competition by a large margin.
Muhammad Azeem previously came to the fore after he winning several schools meets in Perak, before garnering international notoriety when he won the 100m and the 200m at last year’s South-east Asia (Sea) Youth Championship in Iligan City in the Philippines.
At the Sea meet, Muhammad Azeem clocked in 10.69 seconds and 21.50 seconds in the boys’ 100m and 200m finals respectively and won gold for both events.
He had even erased Thailand’s Rattanopon Sowan’s record of 10.74 seconds for the 100m event.
On Twitter, Team Malaysia, a body that brings together supporters and fans of Malaysian athletes, praised Muhammad Azeem and called for the nation’s governing body to keep an eye on the budding athletics star.
“We have to really take care of this young talent from Perak.
“(He) succeeded in lowering his personal best record below 11 seconds in the 100m. That is some speed!” said the tweet.
However, for Muhammad Azeem, his record is still shadowed by Khairul Hafiz Jantan’s national record of 10.15 seconds set in 2016.
