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DAD AND IDOL: C. Kunalan is everything to his daughter Mona, herself a top national sprinter. She is now a freelance personal trainer. -- ST PHOTO: HOE PEI SHAN
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MONA Kunalan grew up building sandcastles at the National Stadium's long jump pit and swinging on ropes hanging from the ceiling of the Kallang gymnasium.
Such were the childhood memories of the daughter of sprint king Canagasabai Kunalan, and former national sprinter Chong Yoong Yin.
'The stadium was my playground,' mused the 35-year-old Mona, a freelance personal trainer.
'My parents used to bring me there from the time I was five, and I would be monkeying around.'
Not for long, though.
Soon, her parents taught her the art of running fast. She was a quick learner. At 12, she won her first Schools' National athletics 100m gold at Kallang.
Mona still holds the girls' national Under-15 100m (12.75sec) and 200m (25.90sec) records set in 1986. She went on to compete in four South-east Asia Games from 1987-1997, including the 1993 edition hosted by Singapore.
The former top sprinter came away with two bronzes in the 1989 and 1997 4x100m relays.
But it was the Schools' National 4x100m relay final in 1987, when she ran the anchor leg, that she remembers most vividly.
Her team were in sixth place when she received the baton. Yet, she never gave up.
Instead, she drew on all her reserves to surge ahead and give her school, St. Theresa's Convent, a surprise victory.
'Almost the whole school came to cheer us on. The noise was deafening,' she recalled.
'I had already won the 100m and 200m in championship-record times, but the relay win meant a lot to my school and to myself.'
Unlike Mona, her father started to sprint at age 21. But he caught on quickly to garner four SEAP and SEA Games golds, a silver and bronze in the Asian Games, and ran in two Olympics within 14 years.
Said the senior Kunalan: 'I used to run barefooted on cinder tracks which would turn mud-like after the rain.
'So, running on the National Stadium's tartan track, Singapore's first synthetic track, was a nice change.'
The torch-bearer during the opening of the 1973 SEAP Games, Kunalan, now a sprightly 64-year-old, will be part of the National Stadium's closing festivities.
He said: 'Kallang was our second home. While the new Sports Hub excites me, the hair on the back of my neck will surely stand on Saturday.'
hpeishan@sph.com.sg
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