KUALA LUMPUR: Who will be the fastest man at the Paris Olympics? Will the 100m winner be world champion Noah Lyles of the United States or Italy's defending champion Marcell Jacobs or world junior champion Letsile Tebogo of Botswana or others?
Malaysians will probably be interested in their own fastest man — that is Azeem Fahmi.
They will want to see how Azeem, who holds the national 100m record of 10.09s, fares against the planet's best speedsters, and hope that he springs a surprise.
The 20-year-old Perakian will compete in the men's 100m preliminary round on Aug 3 - not the heats - as he did not qualify on merit (he got a wild card) for the Olympics.
To go further into the competition, Azeem needs to finish top two in the preliminary round to qualify for the heats.
Azeem will want to produce a sensational time in Paris to redeem himself after a quiet showing in competitions in the first six months of this year.
Following his blistering 10.09 run two years ago at the world youth championships in Cali, Colombia, Azeem has not come anywhere close to his national record. His season best was 10.24 (wind-assisted) in the Louisiana State University meet in April.
Azeem said he hopes to peak at the right time in Paris, like what he did at the Hangzhou Asian Games last year.
At the Asiad, Azeem clocked 10.28 to win his heat, and in the semi-finals, he clocked 10.17. In the final, he ran a splendid 10.11 to win the bronze medal.
Azeem, who was given the Olympic wild card only 11 days ago, said: "Though I came to know not long ago (on July 3) that I will compete in the Olympics, I have set my mind to be ready for any situation.
"I did a lot of positive things during training... there's no reason why I cannot put everything together to clock a good time
"My coaches and I am doing biomechanical analysis starting from next week.
"I'm putting 120 per cent of my training in every practice session. I'm feeling 100 per cent good going to the Olympics.
"My training will be more specific and aggressive. We will also focus more on improving on the start and finishing run.
"It will be my first Olympics and I will give my best and not let the MAF (Malaysian Athletics Federation) down. They gave me the wild card," said Azeem.
"My goal is to run my best race. Anything can happen on race day, I might just set a new national record.
"I hope to get a wonderful timing. I hope to get the outcome that I want at the Olympics.
"The pressure is there as people have high expectations of me. As an athlete, I should not put pressure on myself. I need to prove to people that we can do it.
"I have no fear of running against the best as I had competed against the best in the World Championships in Budapest, Hungary, last year.
"I will do my best and I hope to put Malaysia on the map," said Azeem.
Helping Azeem to prepare are coach Ken Harnden of Auburn University and MAF technical director John Ballard.
Ballard is an experienced coach, having trained Indonesia's Sea Games 100m champion Suryo Agung Wibowo and Dedeh Erawati in women's 100m hurdles for the 2008 Beijing Olympics.
The Australian was the physical performance coach for Indian tennis star Sania Mirza and others for the 2016 Rio de Janeiro Olympics.
Correspondingly, Watson Nyambek featured in the men's 100m in the 2000 Sydney Olympics and clocked 10.61 in the heats and was 62nd overall.
Four years later in Athens, Nazmizan Muhammad clocked 21.24 to finish seventh in the men's 200m heats.
Tan Sri Dr M. Jegathesan competed in three consecutive Olympic Games in Rome (1960), Tokyo (1964) and Mexico (1968).
The flying doctor qualified for the 200m semi-finals twice and set a national record in 1968 (20.92s) that stood for 49 years.