One month and counting....

so it is 1 month till the "Games" and the circus is primed to begin... the drama has begun a long time ago and the truth is that there is never a dull moment in indian sport.... the news of the day today is that 5 wrestlers have failed a dope test and now their participation is in jeopardy. my concerns are only with one of the wrestlers Mausam Khatri who is one of my kids....

the wrestlers have already been shamed with their names and pictures on the front page of the Times of India but has anyone really thought for a second...

FACT- WRESTLERS COME FROM UNEDUCATED AND RURAL BACKGROUNDS

FACT- NONE OF THEM WILL EVEN BE ABLE TO SPELL HALF OF "METHYLHEXAMINE"

FACT- THIS DRUG IS UNKNOWN IN WRESTLING CIRCLES TO HAVE ANY BENEFITS

FACT- NADA FREQUENTLY MAKES MISTAKES WHEN TESTING DUE TO UNPROFESSIONAL SAMPLING METHODS.

FACT- MANY INDIAN SPORTS HAVE A DOPING PROBLEM

I was in just as much shock last night when i heard the news and my first reaction was that i need to reprimand Mausam and the course of punishment, however as i thought about the situation more it is not the wrestler to be blamed.

the first point is that he has no idea what he has taken, although he is taking supplementation his roommate who is on the same supplements as him has tested negative. The second and more important point is that that wrestling federation and Sports authority of india had told me last year that because they need to "professionally" prepare for the Games they don't want the boys training in any world renowned centers but they want them under their control through the duration of the camp. So i do believe that the first people i should point my finger to is them??? what kind of control is this that the wrestlers have been given tainted supplements??? indian athletes have no idea what they are taking, and work solely on trust, even if i give them a pharmacy full of pills and tell them it is good for them they will blindly take it. Although one school of thought is that the athletes need to "smarten up" the real point is that the administrators need to be even more thorough and vigilant.

the second and more valid point is that NADA (national doping agency) is not exactly professional in their collection and maintenance of samples so as is normal procedure all the atheletes will have their "B" samples tested... Shouldn't those results have been published before announcing results??? Them possibly testing positive will make the front page but them being acquited won't even make a side column anywhere.... so really what have we achieved other than an athlete possibly ruining his reputation.

I"M BAAAAAACK

ok i know it has been an eternity and all my eager fans out there are very upset and are going to retaliate by giving me the silent treatment... anyway needless to say that with two big "games" looming in october and november i thought it best to shake off the cobwebs and write a little bit. As is usual practice, with the commonwealth games up first there is tons of drama floating about and that always gets all the sports fans either infuriated or excited (depends which way you want to look at it)

So what better time than now to again showcase our athletes, their performances and the incompetencies of those who call the shots...

Dipika sets the tone

Dipika Pallikal again started off her 2009 with a bang by reaching the final of the British Junior Open...this is an awesome result where she beat her long time nemesis Heba El Torky in a thrilling 11/9, 14/12, 9/11, 14/12 match. The hard core squash fans will remember her beating Heba in last years final... however this year she meets Malaysian Low Wee Wern in the final. Dipika has beaten Low a couple of time last year but has also lost to her so it will be an exciting match up and all keep their fingers crossed for my girl!!!!!

Dipika has always been very successful in the juniors but she will be the first indian to win back to back British Open's if she can pull it off later on today... 

Am soooo proud of her... she has been working very hard and all the hard work is paying off... on a lighter note she did a shoot for Chanel in the december issue of "Beautiful People" so all those out there it is worth checking out...

Boxing

Boxing has dominated the news (at least on the MCT front ) in the last couple days... the boxers have returned after a good performance at the world championships and have returned heroes. the media again have gone after the federation and it was supposedly brought up in parliament that they were transported in a shabby van from the airport to their hotel. 

R U SERIOUS!!! i am now at least convinced that they don't have better things to talk about in parliament... the truth is that our sportspeople are not treated well but that doesn't encompass one van ride from the airport to the hotel which is maybe 15 mins. 

if they want to make a difference why don't they upgrade the facilities that the athletes live in, the poor quality of food that they are fed and the sub standard quality of life they have in the various camps. They really don't care if they ride in a mercedes or tata indica, what they really want is to be able to live in a nice, clean place that will actually make them a whole lot healthier. 

Dinesh Kumar...the coming out party!!!

so closely following in Akhil's footsteps Dinesh Kumar who got in on a wild card also managed to win. This win is more impressive than akhils because this is the same guy whom he had got pummelled by earlier this year at the Olympics. So Dinesh has shown great poise and actually worked very hard. He is a young boxer who has shown a lot of promise and is also another one of our candidates who has come out of a career threatening injury. So we are proud of him and looking to some gold medlas now. 

AKHIL BRINGS ME OUT OF RETIREMENT :)

akhil kumar has again gone and done something great at the 2008 world cup finals in moscow. this is a tournament that is by invitation only for the world's top 8 boxers and akhil has just beaten german marcel schneider 15:6 and got india it's 1st medal in 14 years at a world cup. akhil has been training hard with our trainer heath matthews and is now up against olympic silver medalist from Cuba. All scores can be seen live on www.aiba.org. 

akhil is a very special athlete for us and he is now brimming with the confidence that he can go all the way. His next bout (semis) is on the 13th so everyone get ready for a good showing. 

later on tonight our other boxer Dinesh Kumar is fighting against an algerian boxer whom he lost to at Beijing. But hey its a new day!!!!! COME ON BOYS!!!!

the young ones beckon....

All the associations are going to be flushed with the funds now with over 700cr being allocated to "prepare"athletes for the commonwealth games... how much of that is really going to make it to the athletes in a timely fashion remains to be seen but it is an enormous amount that could actually (if used correctly) be stretched to the next olympics, i somehow doubt that... regardless this gives us a good opportunity to actually help out the young kids and really get good systems in place so that we have a cycle in place to constantly replace the older ones...
The other heartening thing is that our athletes are so touched by all our support that they are eager to give back in any way they can and so I am going to have akhil scout and find out some young and talented boxers and ofcourse abhinav is eager and ready to help out shooting. So for the first time we can actually groom right from the bottom.... actually "creating" champions right from the ground up is something that i have long tried to achieve and since i am now able to do it with such a great group of people nothing could be better.