Asian Games champion Shanti Pereira, 30, savours every moment of an ‘incredible time’

NAGOYA – A day after reaffirming her status as one of the fastest women in Asia, Shanti Pereira showed no signs of slowing down.

On Sept 30, the Asian Games 200m gold medallist was at Hiyoshi Elementary School with her fellow Singapore track and field athletes for a sports exchange programme, before heading back to her hotel for this interview.

Then, she was off again, this time to the Hisaya-odori Park, where she walked down the runway in an event to celebrate the Games’ medallists.

The dust had barely settled after yet another standout campaign for Pereira, who clinched the 100m silver and 200m gold – the first woman to retain the 200m title at the Asiad – and she was determined to enjoy every moment of this whirlwind ride.

A calm and thoughtful Pereira told The Straits Times on Sept 30: “It’s an incredible time to be part of athletics right now because the sport is just growing so much and for myself, maybe more this year, I started to figure out how to enjoy myself throughout the process – the good and the bad – which was very intentional.

“I wanted to work on embracing the process as much as I could which then made me just start having the time of my life and just enjoying every bit of it – even just being on the road, travelling on the circuit or being at home and putting in training blocks, whatever it is.”

For all the joy she has found in this journey, the 30-year-old has also become increasingly aware that an athlete’s career does not last forever.

That has made moments like these all the more precious.

So, when she won the 200m on Sept 27, she took her time to savour the moment as she crossed the line at the Paloma Mizuho Stadium in Nagoya.

She stayed on the track for as long as she could before the men’s 200m final started, soaking in the occasion.

If she had the chance, she would have run a victory lap – a tradition at events like the Olympics and world championships – said Pereira.

Since her first SEA Games at 17, she has had plenty of milestones worth celebrating, as she collected six golds at the regional meet, along with the four golds and four silvers from the Asian championships and Asian Games.

Her moments at the Aichi-Nagoya Games were even more precious as it was “another chance to show all the work that I’ve done that took a lot of time, effort, blood, sweat and tears”.

“Perhaps it’s more so something you would think about when you do get a little bit older and having spent so much time doing this sport,” she added.

“I’m not done yet, but there’s always the thing that sport does not last forever, so I appreciate and treasure every time I get to participate in something like this.”

As precious time slips away for Pereira, her life has become increasingly built around the clock.

Her pursuit of faster times was not just about training hard on the track.

Away from competition, she had to pay attention to the details that could make a difference – her diet, maintaining a fixed sleep schedule, and prioritising recovery before bed, which includes using red light panels, recovery boots and heated tools.

Her coach Luis Cunha, with whom she began training in January 2020, sparked a change in perspective on what it meant to be an athlete.

It took some time and convincing, but she eventually realised that she needed to make changes if she wanted to take herself to a new level.

Noting that it was “quite monumental to my success in the past three, four years”, she added: “Not only did I change my perspective mentally but physically I noticed a lot of changes that were going to a direction of increasing my performance, which is what coach and I wanted, which then showed in the times.”

Since then, she has clocked times she never expected, setting national records of 11.20sec and 22.57sec in the 100m and 200m respectively.

But beyond the numbers, medals and records, she is also chasing something else – her legacy.

She said: “Right now, I’m kind of on a high and I’m just celebrating this big thing that just happened to me, but I also am the kind of person who just wants to keep breaking barriers.

“As I’ve grown more in the sport, I’ve grown more accustomed to the pressure that comes with that, but now it excites me more than anything else. So for however much time I have left in this sport, I just want to keep pushing as hard as I can and hopefully that would inspire more and more people to do the same.”

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