Five kids from the country won a 100m talent hunt and earned themselves a week of training in Australia with none other than Sharon Hannan, who coached Sally Pearson to 100m hurdles gold at london Olympics last year. They came back more confident, more sound and wiser to share their experience with GARIMA VERMA
Before 11-year-old Shabnam Shokeen landed in Australia to train with Sharon Hannan, she had neither heard about her nor had any clue about her protégé Sally Pearson being an Olympic champion.
For this seventh standard girl from Sarvodaya Kanya Vidyalaya in Dharampur, Najafgarh, life till then was all about hide and seek, helping her mother happily in house chores, loving Social Studies and hating Science. In last two years, even her coach Surender Fauji had to make efforts to sustain her interest in athletics training.
But Speedstar, a Kids Out Of Home (KOOH) Sports initiative changed it all for her. As it did for the other five kids too, who won the nationwide talent hunt for fastest 100m sprinters in various age groups. The six winners — a boy and a girl each in under 12, 14 and 16 categries — were rewarded with a week-long training session with Sharon Down Under.
“She has returned a completely different person from Australia,” said Shabnam’s coach Surender Fauji, who spotted her potential during a competition, a part of his initiative to groom talented school kids into future athletes. Earlier this week, Fauji also started his residential training school Baalak Bhavishya in Ghummanhera village to help under-privileged kids get regular training without having to worry for day-to-day necessities.
“Earlier I used to give up trying to ask her to give attention to her starting action. She would hardly listen. And, now she is the one who tells others how important it is to have good action for a good start into the race,” Fauji added of Shabnam, who now stays in the ‘Gurukul’, trains in the morning, goes to school, trains in the evening and helps the seniors with work as the set-up is completely run by the coaches and their families, with the help of raw material donations and volunteer work from nearby villagers.
“The facilities there were so much better and different than here,” began Shabnam, who won the Delhi leg before winning the under-12 final with a timing of 14.04 seconds. “Everyone there was either running or cycling. No one was sitting idle, killing time. We would take at least 100 years to get such facilities,” added the chirpy girl, whose home in Deenpur village is hardly three kilometres from a certain Virender Sehwag’s house but cricket has failed to excite her the way athletics did.
Sharon on her part was though impressed, she advised caution to keep the kids from burning out due to excessive training. “My initial analysis is that these children are training far too much for athletics,” Sharon told The Pioneer in an email interview when asked about her analysis of the kids’ talent.
“They should be enjoying a variety of activities like gymnastics, swimming, ball sports, climbing, crawling, breathing exercises, stretching and playing activities. I definitely don’t believe children should be participating in one sport every day, and definitely not for several hours each day,” added Sharon, who coaches at Gold Coast Victory Athletics Club in Queensland.
“I hope that next time they can bring some coaches to Australia.”
Sharon also shared Sally’s training secrets and full training schedule with the kids to give them an idea about long Term Athlete Development Training.
And, Shabnam was indeed impressed with the variety in training, especially as it came with an occasional visit to the beach and zoo, where koalas won her affection over the famous Australian kangaroos.
“Sharon ma’am told us so much about how to train, how to warm-up, stretch, action at the start of the race and how to work on areas susceptible to pain. I even learned how to swim as ma’am focused on a lot on pool sessions,” Shabnam said.
While five of the six winners made it for the training stint, under-16 boy winner MS Arun from Chennai could not join the group as his passport formalities could not be completed in time. As a KOOH Sports official informed, “many of the kids that participated don’t even have channels to contact them. For Arun too, the process of getting a passport was proving quite confusing. We tried to get his process done but due to difficulty in contacting him we could not get his papers on time.”
Pune girl Siddhi Hirey, the under-14 winner in girls with 13.01 seconds, also found the water training different and effective. “My coach Sanjay Patnakar had also given me almost similar tips but the training sessions in water were quite different. She (Sharon) made us train in various depths. She showed us how our action would improve that way and even if we have any injury, training in water would make sure the speed doesn’t go away during recovery,” said Siddhi, who is currently on a vacation-cum-training in US at her maternal aunt’s place in Madison.
“I came here for vacation but didn’t feel like discontinuing my training. So my uncle introduced me to Hassan Pasha, who coaches the local kids,” Siddhi added. “But one thing that stood out during the training sessions with Sharon was the importance she gave to arm action. And the best part was that no one else than the athletes and coaches would be on ground during the sessions, no onlookers to distract you.”
Getting to watch Sally herself at work was an added bonus. “We saw her training. She was so full of concentration that it seemed no one could disturb her. She would not speak to anyone till she was done with her practice,” an impressed Siddhi said.
“Just by looking at her running we could understand a lot about the right movements,” Shabnam added.
Sally was also equally impressed with the youngsters from India. “I watched some of the training session of the young Indian athletes with my coach. I was quite impressed with their keenness to listen, try and then listen again. They seemed especially keen to try different techniques and then listen again to feedback. I hope they enjoyed the opportunity to work with my coach,” Sally said.
An XI grader in Pune’s Abhinav Vidyalaya, Siddhi though has the luxury of a private trainer back home and enough support from her former national level long-distance runner mother, facilities stood out even for her.
More so for one Palisetti Siva, for whom track meant “mitti ka ground” and synthetic tracks were something new to him. An Andhra Pradesh Sports School product, Siva’s school in Shamirpet is almost 30 kms from better facilities of Hyderabad.
“I was training for the first time in water. Sharon ma’am focussed a lot on basics and technical training,” Siva managed in his confusing mix of Hindi-English. “I was in fourth standard when I started training. I have just cleared ninth now and one thing I am sure about is that I would continue in sports.”
Facilities and support notwithstanding back home, like Siva, Shabnam has also found her calling. “Ab to bas Olympic medal lana hai Sally ma’am ke jaise.”
The country is also waiting for that. But as Sharon warned, let’s not force them out of childhood sooner than required.