Prathima Hegde
Ten-pin bowling is not a physically taxing sport, so more girls should take to it. That’s Prathima Hegde, the 2009 national tenpin bowling champion, speaking. Having ‘bowled’ it out for seven years, the unassuming Prathima should know.
“I must say that interest in tenpin among girls is much more and the women’s game is much better than the men’s. Tenpin bowling is not physically very taxing and I hope more and more girls come into the sport. After all, from quantity comes quality and who knows, there might be a champion in the making,” said Prathima, who finally won the national title at Gurgaon in what was her sixth nationals, after winning the bronze three times and the silver twice.
Explaining her close misses, she says, “I came close to winning but just one bad game cost me the title. If you look at the scores, the winning (margin) was just about 20 pins or so. But this time, I won by almost 300 pins.”
How did her game improve so much? “I think the training stint in Malaysia helped me tremendously. We trained under the Malaysian national coach Holloway Cheah and that has improved me a lot. It shows in my averages. I used to average about 180 or so. Now I am doing 192 or even 194. That is very encouraging.”
Has the difference in quality of play when competing with top Asian women narrowed down? “Certainly. They have been in the sport for long. We have just got into it. It will take time but we are on the right track. If we can manage averages of about 225, we will be able to think of winning a medal at the Asian level,” says Prathima, who has represented India in the Asian Games in Doha in 2006 and the Asian Indoor Games in 2007.
Can India make deeper inroads down the tenpin bowling alley? “Why not? We now have the best of equipment in the country. The federation also has ambitious plans to train bowlers on a long-term basis. In three to five years, Indians will surely be counted among the top players in Asia,” Prathima feels.
“We need more international exposure. Once we are not psychologically under pressure, we can match the best. (And that will happen) only if we play in more tournaments abroad. ”
What is her immediate aim? “My aim is to win something for the country in the near future,” says the modest champion.
Harsh Vardhan Sarda.
By winning the men’s national tenpin bowling title for the third time, Delhi ace Harsh Vardhan Sarda provided a lesson or two to younger aspirants.
Sarda won the national title for the first time in 1999. He repeated the effort in 2004. After a gap of another five years, Sarda bounced back brilliantly to hit the front from Day One and simply got going, without having to look over his shoulders.
For the others were far behind.
In fact, the Sarda family is hooked to the sport. Rather ironically however, they don’t employ the ‘hook’ bowling style but spin their way to glory.
Sarda’s wife, Anuradha, has been knocking at the doors of the national championship for a while. Having finished second or third at least four times, it seems only a matter of time before she also emerges a champion. Sarda’s son, Dhruv is also a fine exponent having been in the Elite Indian squad formed by the Tenpin Bowling Federation for exposure and coaching trips abroad. Dhruv was placed fourth behind his father on the first day in this year’s championship. But then his father led the way till the end and hopefully, the son will follow in his footsteps before long.
Recalling his unexpected victory, Sarda says, “Well, before the tournament I doubted if I would be able to be among the top five, let alone win. For, now there are so many youngsters who are capable of winning. In any case, I felt there was no harm in giving it a try. As I did very well on the first day and took the lead, I was very inspired and from then on, I never looked back. After I won it, I really felt very happy that I could come back and win it again for the third time after five years,” says Sarda, who strives to perfect his game watching video clips.
Detailing how tenpin bowling has changed over the course of his career, he said, “The game has changed a lot. Earlier, we played on only one oil surface and condition. Now we have to play on two, short and long oil conditions and that takes a lot from the bowlers.”
Explaining why he has not represented India he says, “Now it is compulsory for bowlers to train under a coach abroad or in a camp at home. I’ve not been able to spare time for that and I have missed representing the country. Hopefully, I will do so in future.”
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