Murali Sreeshankar is an Indian athlete who won the silver medal in the men’s long jump at the ongoing Commonwealth Games 2022.
At the CWG 2022, Sreeshankar had a best jump of 8.08m. He holds the national record of 8.36 metres
In March 2018, Sreeshankar cleared a 7.99 m jump at the Federation Cup in Patiala. He was named in the Indian contingent for the 2018 Commonwealth Games. However, he had to pull out 10 days before the April event after being diagnosed with appendicitis.
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The 23-year-old underwent emergency appendix surgery. Two months later, he participated in the 2018 Asian Junior Athletics Championships in Gifu. Despite having “less strength, speed and focus” due to the surgery, he won bronze with a jump of 7.47 metres.
At the 2018 Asian Games in Jakarta, he finished sixth in the final with 7.95 metres. In September 2018, he broke the national record at the National Open Athletics Championships in Bhubaneswar where he achieved a jump of 8.20 m.
The achievement was also the world leading jump of the season among under-20 athletes. He became the first Indian athlete to qualify for the 2019 World Athletics Championships scheduled to be held in September–October in Doha.
At the World Championships, Sreeshankar failed to qualify for the finals. Sreeshankar qualified for the 2020 Summer Olympics by recording a jump of 8.26m, a new national record, at the Federation Cup in Patiala in March 2021.
At the Olympics, he registered a jump of 7.69m in the qualifying round and failed to enter the final.
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At the 2022 World Athletics Championships, he qualified for the final round and finished seventh with a jump of 7.96 m.
Sreeshankar’s coached was his father S. Murali, who is a former triple jump athlete and silver medalist at the South Asian Games.
His mother, K. S. Bijimol, had won silver medal in 800 metres at the 1992 Asian Junior Athletics Championships. His sister Sreeparvathy is a heptathlete.