Mirror Magazine - Wushu champions bring home the medals

“Stances, kicks, punches, balances, jumps and sweeps. Wushu seems like quite a facinating sport to behold. However, even with it’s relative unheard of status in the local scene, our Lankan Wushu team of 12 members walked away from the 10th South Asian Games (SAG), with a total of 10 medals, including four Golds. Quite an impressive performance considering that three of the four Golds we got were for the Wushu discipline of Taolu, that was only introduced to SAG this year.

Speaking to the man with a constant smile on his face, Prabath Manuranga, who won Gold for the Taolu event – Nanquan – Nandao – Nangung, I discovered that his initial interest in the sport stemmed from a martial arts film he watched when he was a kid. Having schooled at the Gamini National School in Nuwara Eliya, he then decided to pursue the sport under Coach Ruchira Bodinagoda. In addition to training with his coach, he also practices on his own, whenever he has free time, he said.

“Wushu helps widen your knowledge and attain peace of mind, it helps even with my everyday life” he said. “Even more than winning, it was very important to me that what I did was technically correct. Of course winning a medal and doing my country proud was definitely my goal but, I just had to do it right,” he said determinedly. However, he was a bit disappointed with his performance at the Games, as he felt that he hadn’t performed up to his fullest potential, maybe due to the immense pressure he was faced with, he said. However, it was obviously a good enough performance for him to have won Gold, so all his hard work wasn’t in vain.

“My family was not very keen on my doing this sport at first, as none of them had ever participated in any sports etc., However, they gradually came around, and are now very proud of my achievements,” he said proudly. As far as support and encouragement goes, his company Unichela not only sponsors him but even provided him with a practice carpet for his training he adds thankfully.

Thilak Hettiarachchi (25) from Veyangoda, was the only Gold medalist in the art of Sanshu. His is an unfortunate tale however, as Thilak may even be forced bring an end to his sporting career due to economic reasons. Having reached his peak, yet being unemployed, it would be quite a waste (particularly to the country), if necessity were to force him to sacrifice his career.

Having started out under the guidance of his coach Sugath Pathirana from the Scientific Wushu Research Centre in his home town, Thilak learnt the very basics of Wushu from him, “…he brought me up until the National level,” he said appreciatively. “Thereafter, I continued training under National Coach Leel Darmapriya, who then took over the reins from Coach Pathirana.” Having started Wushu when he was about 12 years old, he trains about 4-5 days a week.

“I must thank the officials of the Federation and especially Manel Dharmakeerthi for his tireless efforts to get this event included in to the SAG and also to T.B. Ekanayake who also supported me a lot,” he said gratefully. “I cannot forget my parents, relations and friends for all their encouragement and support and a very special thank you to a special someone who has always been a pillar of strength to me, for I just could not have done it without them all,” he said smilingly.

He also extends much appreciation to the Chinese coach Laoshi Zhu Hong, who helped train them for SAG. “As it’s a sport that I’ve done right from my childhood, I’m very happy to have come this far in it,” he said.

Sujith Manju Kumara (30) the Taijiquan Gold Medalist from the Hill Capital and is also now coaching the Piliyandala Central College Wushu Team. Taijiquan requires a slow flowing body movement where you are made more aware of your own balance and what affects it and you learn to use your strength whilst concentrating hard on the quality of your movements.

As a child, having watched his coach Ruchira Bodinagoda display his skills, Sujith had been drawn to the sport. Thereafter, he began training under him and went on to win Gold for his event at two South Asian Wushu Championships (Katmandu and India in 2000 and 2003 respectively). He also participated at the Asian Games in Korea in 2002, the World Wushu Championships in Vietnam in 2000 and the World Wushu Championship in Mecca in 2003.

He too, working at Unichela is given all the support, and facilities he requires to carry out his sports. “I would like to especially thank Dian Gomes the CEO of Unichela, Palitha Pieris and Heshan Mendis, who’ve encouraged me and supported me over the past four years of my sporting career,” he said. Also, much thanks to Hemasiri Fernando the Chairman of the Olympic Committee, who agreed to introduce these new events to the Games, if not for which we would have been three Gold Medals less in the total tally,” he said.

Speaking of dedication to the sport, even his wife was part of the SAG team and does the same style of Wushu as him, he said. She too is a former South Asian Championship medalist.

“I think it was more difficult to perform here in my home country with all my family and friends watching than even at a world tournament. With a knee injury whilst I was training in China and much against the advice of all the doctors, I realised that if I couldn’t participate in the games held in my own country then there was no point so, I made up mind that I just had to do it, both for my country and for my company that had helped me so much, and well…I guess I did,” he said with a smile.

Winning Gold in Taolu – (Changquan - Daoshu – Gunshu), Asanka Sujeewan (23) from Mahawa said that the art of Changquan requires a lot of flexibility and athleticism and whoever comes closest to performing the art without breaking any of the rules, stands the best chance of winning Gold. All the points of the three segements are added together resulting in the highest scorer getting the Gold. What’s more, he was even the top scorer of all three of his categories, being the only Sri Lankan to do that, he said with pride. U

Unlike Changquan, the other two parts of his event are performed armed. Both Daoshu and Gunshu require the handling of weopons and thus requires a lot of skill as you need to display the correct art of handling a sword or stick to fight off your opponent, he added.

He first trained under Mahendra Ekanayake, whilst he was still in school at the Mahawa Vijayaba National School, and later under the two national coaches Leel Darmapriya and Saman Bandara. Having showed interest in the sport when he was just nine, he was first coached by his elder brother, Anil Jayasiri who was also into Wushu at the time.

Having two practice sessions daily, Sujeewan worked very hard towards the games.

“The pre-SAG training where we were sent to the ‘Beijing Sport University’, through the Ministry of Sports, was very useful, as we learnt a lot there,” he said. “I especially want to thank the President of the Wushu Federation, P.B. Ekanayake and Milton Amarasinghe also from the Federation and the South Asian Wushu Secretary Manel Dharmakeerthi, without whose support I wouldn’t have been able to achieve this great honour for my country,” he said.