‘Unstoppable’ Rumesh revives Sri Lanka’s glory, one javelin throw at a time

• In a small coastal town just south of the Sri Lankan capital, Colombo, a young Rumesh Pathirage daydreamed about running away from school to a field where he could practise fast bowling, running, or anything other than being buried in books.
• Academic excellence was not the promised path to glory for him.
• No, his path was on a synthetic rubber track, from which he would launch his javelin until it landed in the history books and made him world number one.