Back-stroker Srihari primed for Tokyo 2020 qualification event
The Hindu
India’s premier back-stroker feels he is in the best shape ever, ahead of Uzbekistan Open
The final stretch leading into a competition like the Olympic Games is generally reserved by athletes to even out rough edges and chisel their games to perfection. But for Srihari Nataraj, India’s best bet to achieve the elusive A-mark Olympic Qualifying Time in swimming, it has been markedly different. A combination of factors — the National lockdown last year, a shoulder injury and a personal tragedy (loss of his father) — have meant the 20-year-old back-stroker is only back in shape now, looking to get as many events as possible three months shy of the July 23 start date for Tokyo 2020. This week he is in Tashkent for the Uzbekistan Open swimming championships, an Olympic qualification event, hoping to bridge the 0.84 seconds gap between his best timing (54.69s) and the A-mark (53.85s) in his pet 100m backstroke race scheduled for Thursday.He has worn India’s blues, albeit in an Under-19 World Cup, with K.L. Rahul, Mayank Agarwal, Harshal Patel and Jaydev Unadkat as his teammates. He has proudly adorned the Lion’s Crest — the famed Mumbai cricket logo — in all three formats. He has played with Yuvraj Singh, against Virat Kohli and Rahul Dravid and has the likes of Rahul and Joe Root in his illustrious list of dismissals. He is also a software developer for an IT giant, based in California. Virtually every middle-class Indian over the last three decades at some stage dreams of being either a cricketer or an IT professional. Saurabh Netravalkar has been combining two dreams, even after relocating to USA to pursue academics at the prestigious Cornell University in 2015.
Unlike most of the Olympic-bound athletes, who opt to train abroad before the big event, boxer Amit Panghal prefers training in home conditions prior to Paris 2024. A former World championships silver medallist and a World No. 1, Panghal won the 51kg quota place in the only chance he got. He wants to follow his own plans to script success in Paris.
The other men’s semifinal Friday is Norway’s Casper Ruud, twice the runner-up in Paris — to Rafael Nadal in 2022 and to Novak Djokovic in 2023 — against Germany’s Alexander Zverev, a finalist at the 2020 U.S. Open, an Olympic gold medalist and into the final four at Roland Garros for the fourth consecutive year.