By Les Tan and Erwin Wong
Poh Seng Song (extreme left), 30, with fellow national athletes Kenneth Khoo (centre) and Lance Tan. Seng Song’s last SEA Games was in 2009. (Photo by Asmah Hanim. Used with permission)
Poh Seng Song, 30, will be running for Singapore at the upcoming 2013 South-east Asian Games. A veteran of four SEA Games, Seng Song is also an Olympian, having taken part in the 2004 Olympic Games in Athens.
At the 2003 SEA Games, Seng Song anchored the Singapore 4x100m relay team to a silver medal with a lunge at the finishing line after taking the baton in fourth place at the final changeover. It was Singapore’s first relay silver since 1977.
Seng Song was also part of the 2007 SEA Games 4x400m relay quartet that clocked 3 minutes 13.70 seconds, just off the national record of 3:10.55.
The 2009 SEA Games saw Seng Song make his last appearance for Singapore before he decided to come out of retirement this year. We catch up with Seng Song about his return to competitive running.
Red Sports: We saw your name on the list of athletes heading for the 2013 SEA Games in Myanmar and said to ourselves, “That’s a name we haven’t seen in a while!” The last time you went to the SEA Games was 2009. What prompted a comeback?
Poh Seng Song: I have always been passionate about track and field, never a doubt about that. Ever since I ‘hung up’ my spikes in the mid of 2010 due to work commitments, I always had a longing to get back to the track and compete.
I guess I miss the thrill and the adrenaline rush of the competitive arena. As for the reason which prompted me to return to the track scene, I guess you can call it a sequence of events which slowly unfolded during the beginning of this year.
If I remember correctly, it was in early March this year when Captain Stanley Wee called me and asked if I would be interested in taking part in this year’s SIA Track and Field Championships. He is the track and field chairman for our Team Fusion. In SIA we have three main teams competing at the meet – Team Fusion, Cabin Crew and SIA Engineering.
Of course, I was excited, but obviously, I wanted to get a respectable timing. That is when I started to return to training.
After the SIA meet, which went pretty well, my Coach Slava (Viatcheslav Vassiliev) asked me if I wanted to sign up for the Singapore Open, to which I agreed. However, I told myself to aim higher and try to get a decent timing which would put me in a position for a SEA Games nomination.
Another obstacle was to decide if I wanted to run the 100m or the 400m, keeping in mind that I only had five weeks left to the Singapore Open.
The most important reason of all which really pushed me to qualifying for the SEA Games is that just before I ‘retired’ from running, Dipna [Lim-Prasad, my girlfriend] told me that she really wanted to go with me to the SEA Games. I guess when I stopped three years ago, we thought that it would never happen. I am just glad that I managed to push myself to make it happen!
What made you stop doing track at the highest level?
Seng Song: Work commitments.
When did you graduate from SMU and what have you been doing since?
Seng Song: I graduated in April 2008 and decided to train full-time for the rest of the year. After qualifying for the 100m for the 2009 SEA Games in December the same year, I found a job as an executive with the Cultural and Education Programme Department with the Singapore Youth Olympic Games Organising Committee in February 2009.
After about four months, I changed jobs and worked as a lecturer in the Institute of Technical Education in Simei until June 2010 the following year.
I have been training as a commercial pilot since June 2010, until I came out of retirement.
How do you see your role in the current team and how does it compare with your previous stint in the national team in the last decade?
Seng Song: I am currently the third-oldest in the team, compliments to Kenneth [Khoo] and James [Wong] who are in the team. I guess that hasn’t really differed much, considering that they both were in the team as well in 2009.
I guess the main thing which I can contribute is to share my experiences and exposure to my juniors, some of whom are going for their very first SEA Games.
Looking back, what are some of the highlights of your track career?
Seng Song: Definitely competing in the 2004 Olympic Games in Athens.
What do you know now that you wish you knew then when you were first starting out in track?
Seng Song: I guess training methods and my body mechanics. Rather than experimenting, I guess that having this additional knowledge would definitely be better. Then again, a lot of things are rather subjective as well.
What differences do you see in the local athletics scene now as compared to when you left it in 2010?
Seng Song: I think that Track and Field is getting more recognition, and this can be seen by some athletes who have put aside everything and gone into full-time training for this year’s SEA Games.
You were pretty much Singapore’s main man in the century sprint in the last decade, having made four consecutive SEA Games 100m finals from 2003 to 2009. How do you rate the current crop of sprinters – Gary Yeo, Muhd Amirudin, Lee Cheng Wei, Muhd Elfi, Calvin Kang?
Seng Song: They are all very talented and able to go very far, I guess one piece of advice I can give them is that, even though sometimes they are not able to hit their personal best for a very long period of time, they should just persevere, because when everything clicks together, their performance can be astounding!
You were part of the 2007 SEA Games 4x400m relay quartet that seriously challenged the national record of 3:10.55. Your team clocked 3:13.70. You’ll be running the 4x400m relay again in Myanmar. What do you hope to achieve with the current team?
Seng Song: I would definitely want the team to run below 3:13.70, which is a timing that’s definitely within our reach. We have the capability, and if that does materialise, that is definitely the first step in working towards breaking the national record and getting a medal in the 2015 SEA Games.
You’ve been in the workforce for a good few years now. How do you juggle work, training, family, relationships, and everything that a 30-year-old Singaporean male has to deal with?
Seng Song: One word to summarise it all: SACRIFICE. I can’t expect to have to do well in work, track and on top of that, do a million other things as well.
Sometimes I might not be able to go out and meet my friends who are meeting late at night, as I need my rest and sometimes I might have to cancel family arrangements as my weekends are taken up by competitions. It is always a balance, I am just glad that I have very understanding family and friends.
Poh Seng Song Bio
Age: 30
Date of birth: January 30, 1983
Records (including age group)
National Youth and Under-17 200m Record – 21.87s (ASEAN Schools Championships, August 4, 1999)
National Inter-School Championships: B Div Boys 200m – 21.88 seconds (1999)
National Inter-School Championships: A Div Boys 100m – 10.80s (2001, since broken by Donovan Chan in 2012)
Institute-Varsity-Polytechnic Championships: 200m – 21.4s (2004)
Participation at Major Games
2004 Olympic Games
100m heats – 10.75s
2008 World Indoor Championships
60m heats – 6.93s
2000 World Junior Championships
100m heats – 11.14s
2002 World Junior Championships
4x100m relay (with Izwan Firdaus, Erzalmaniq Fawzy Rawi and Muhd Shameer Ayub) – 41.87s (National junior record) [Record broken in 2005]
2003 South-east Asian Games
100m final – 10.65s, 7th
4x100m relay – silver medal (first relay silver since 1977. Seng Song was the relay anchor and took the team from 4th at the final changeover to second place with a desperate lunge at the finishing line)
2005 South-east Asian Games
100m final – 10.58s, 4th
4x100m relay – bronze medal
2007 South-east Asian Games
100m final – 10.81s, 8th
4x100m relay – 4th (new national record, breaking old mark that had stood since 1994)
4x400m relay – 5th
2009 South-east Asian Games
100m final – 10.70s, 5th
All of us at Red Sports wish Poh Seng Song all the best at the 2013 SEA Games! Do drop Seng Song a note of support in the comments section if you can. We’re sure he’ll appreciate it. You can also upload photos showing your support of Seng Song on Instagram using #ourteamsg, or on the Team Singapore campaign’s website: www.ourteamsg.com
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