THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: A father training his child in a sport in which he has a glorious past. The child, through his efforts, achieves a top honour in the game — though it seems like a film plot, this is an excerpt from the life of the Nedumangad native Nikhilesh, whose son Neeraj emerged as the gold medal winner of the 83kg senior boys powerlifting competition at the Central Stadium here on Monday.
A Class 11 student of Anad SNVHSS, Neeraj lifted a total weight of 542.5 kg in three sets of the competition, comprising squat, bench press, and deadlift.
“Though I decided to get trained in powerlifting over three years, I had only been taking it up seriously for the last two years,” said the 17-year-old, who was the bronze medal winner in the same event the year before. Taking inspiration from his father, Neeraj said that he considered his father to be his role model.
Yet another sports talent, who had to end his career due to financial issues, Nikhilesh was 19 years old when he won the All India Inter University Powerlifting championship at Ratnagiri in the early 2000s. He later went on to win medals in multiple national meets, when life became the toughest weight he had to lift.
The player who could have been the pride of the land now does loading, tapping, and other daily wage work for a living. Still, when his children saw his spark in the sport during a local powerlifting programme, Nikhilesh’s children started developing a taste for it.
“When I first saw my father doing weightlifting, I was worried about his health. But when I got into the sport, I realised the ‘high’ it gave,” said Neeraj, indicating his father’s multiple disc-bulge issues.
Adding to this, Nikhilesh commented that his son was not really interested in sports at the beginning, and is amazed at how good Neeraj became under his training. “Not just him, I was also the trainer for my elder daughter, Nikhitha, who is also a powerlifting star, and has represented India in the World Powerlifting Championship in 2022,” he said.
