JEDDAH, 14 December 2007 — For Mohammad Al-Khuwaildi life has been a rollercoaster of success and failure; win some, lose some. But he’ll stop at nothing to try and improve himself and explore the limits of human endurance.
After winning the long jump gold medal at the Pan Arab Games, Al-Khuwaildi, 26, raises the bar further as he bids to win the first Olympic gold medal for Saudi Arabia in the 2008 Beijing Summer Olympic Games.
“A gold medal in the 2008 Beijing Olympics and wishes for the support needed to train abroad properly,” said Al-Khuwaildi of future plans in his career.
Though retirement in five years’ time had crossed his mind, Al-Khuwaildi said, “ I wont be able to let go of long jump so easily, I’d definitely be coaching and passing what I’ve learned to the younger ones.”
Before he became a long jump specialist Al-Khuwaildi had dabbled in football, basketball and various other disciplines in athletics. He landed a fulltime job at Aramco after finishing the two-year English and accountancy program offered by the national oil company. The Aramco offer made him quit the Physical Education course he was pursuing at King Saud University in Riyadh.
Believing the best is yet to come and that one should never lose hope was the key to his latest success in November in Egypt. In winning the gold in his favorite event Al-Khuwaildi set a new Arab record of 8.19 meters.
After his competition, he said, the first thing that flashed back in his mind was his participation in the 11th IAAF World Championships in Osaka, Japan. There he said Panamanian long jumper Irving Saladino succeed in his last attempt, “This gave me hope, if he could do it then why can’t I,” he said.
Al-Khuwaildi has had an indifferent performance at the Osaka event no thanks to the bureaucratic red tape. In the past he freely trains under the cover of a royal decree that then ordered government and private sectors to allow their employees who happen to be athletes to train. That is no longer in force. With a note that says “if there is no dire need for the athletes, allow them to leave ” companies and government offices have been given the discretion whether or not to give sanctioned leaves. Such a setup kept Al-Khuwaildi from joining the team in their camps abroad and getting proper training.
Hence instead of catching up with Saladino and Italian Andrew Howe in Osaka, he failed to pass the qualifying round with an attempt of 7.85 meters.
“They kept encouraging me but I could not do it,” he said. He explained he was away from training for so long since his participation in the World Athletics Final in Stuttgart where he placed second for his jump of 8.34 meters.
“I lost sense of the takeoff board and the fast track, it is not the same here as in Osaka, I lost around 50 cm and failed all three attempts because I did not train well,” he said.
“People thought I’d be breaking down after that, but it’s not true. Thank God I just needed sometime to rest. I then managed to get back again and did my best to remind people of Al-Khuwaildi and honor my country again in a huge Arab nations gathering like the Arab Games,” he added.
He had wanted to participate at the Macau 2nd Asian Indoor Games in October, but once again he could not. “If I want to compete there, I want to be prepared and it was impossible to be fit in the three days Aramco gave me before the event kicked off.
”When the leave for the Arab Games came two weeks in advance, it was not enough but at least I managed to dedicate all my time to training and trained with my coach here and went there feeling very well and optimistic,” said the long jump star of Safwa city in the Eastern Province.
Al-Khuwalidi’s passion in long jump began at the age of 14. He managed to distinguish himself immediately as he joined the youth team and was the first to jump over a distance of 7.32 meters.
“I was amazed how most of the spectators would gather near the long jump event, I guess because it lasts for up to an hour and gives chances to the athletes to advance after several attempts. Results are unpredictable. Surprises occur many times at the last attempts changing the whole rankings as the enthusiasm continues and I believe that’s why I found myself in it too,” he said.
When Al-Khuwaildi joined the youth team, he managed to progress and jumped 7.62 meters. In 2002, he participated in the GCC Athletics Championship for men and jumped 8.18 meters for the first time, while his teammate Hussain Al-Saba’s best number was 8.33. Since then the duo along with Ahmed Faiz, who had a career-best of 8.12 meters, had been reaping honors for Saudi Arabia. They enjoyed competing against each other here, and together abroad.
“This made the competition even better especially knowing that in the world there are around 20 who could jump over 8 meters as their average performance throughout the year, and three of them are in Saudi Arabia !” Al-Khuwaildi says with a grin. Al-Khuwaildi had trained under different coaches such as Hameed Saheel in 2002, Polish coach Zdzislaw Kokot from 2003 to 2004, and Romanian triple jumper Bedros Bedrosian in 2005. In that year, “it was another major turning point for me as we went to train in South Africa before the 1st Islamic Solidarity Games in Jeddah. My jumps reached 8.40 meters and above. I could not believe it but they assured me it was true,” he said. At the Solidarity Games he broke the Asian record on the way to the gold medal with 8.44 meters.
In 2006, Algerian Masoud Bouhouche trained Al-Khuwaildi until recently. It was not a fortunate year as he suffered three injures including a hamstring injury that denied him participation in the World Cup. Still, he was considered second among world champions according to the International Association of Athletics Federations rankings.
A towering presence at 188cms. that earned him the moniker “Mr. Nice Height”, Al-Khuwaildi said he wants to see a new generation of long jumpers at least eight years younger that would keep the achievements continuing even when the Saudi long jump trio are gone.
