CHENNAI: In January this year, Vishnu Saravanan, with his ILCA (International Laser Class Association) 7 class dinghy, became the first Indian sailor to qualify for the Paris Olympics via the World Championship. The 27-year-old secured the qualification as he finished 26th amongst 152 sailors in Adelaide to make it to his second consecutive Olympics.
With the earned experience in Tokyo, where he finished 20th out of 35, Saravanan is ready to face the newest challenge."In Tokyo, I was a bit fearless. I just went ‘Okay, it’s my first Olympics. I don’t really care about the results. So I just want to sail my best and see where I land up.’ And I did ok," he mentioned in a virtual media conference organised by Sports Authority of India.
"Tokyo helped me grow as an athlete and mature as a person. That's what made me realise you have to keep being in the present and keep following the routine and that will lead to good things. Leading to Paris, I have more time to train and it has been going well so far," he mentioned.
Leading into the Olympics, Mumbai-based Army Subedar is practicing at the sailing Olympic venue in the port city of Marseille alongside the Olympic medalists from Cyprus and Croatia. "I’ve been lucky to be able to train in the Olympic waters and have such good training partners who actually won Olympic medals. I’m training with Pavlos Kontides and Tonči Stipanović, who’ve been in the top five for many years. So it’s quite a solid group. As I say, I am in the Army, but I’ve never been in the war. But when I’m sailing on the water with these guys, it feels like I’m at war every day because the intensity is super high and my heart rate never goes below 150," he said.
To reach this level, where he is competing with some of the best sailors in the world, Saravanan had to go through multiple qualification rounds. The Asian Games in Hangzhou and the Continental Qualifiers in Thailand did not go the way he wanted, but that only ignited the fire within to keep fighting for the Olympics spot.
"The qualification was the first step after the main season and the first qualification for me was the Asian Games which I narrowly missed. That hurt a bit. The next qualification after that was the World Championships in the Netherlands. I had a bad day and it messed me up with the performance and the position dropped. After the World Championships, we had the Asian Sailing Championships in December in Thailand, I was hoping to qualify there, but I finished fourth, as the top two nations were qualifying," Saravanan explained the multiple steps involved before the World Championship regatta in Adelaide.
In the build up to the Worlds in January, Saravanan was unable to focus. A loss in Thailand changed the way he looked at his chances of making it to the Olympics. "I was not able to focus, but it kind of sounds crazy, but at that time, I was hoping that I wouldn't qualify in Thailand because it's a continental qualifier. I would like to qualify through the World Championships because that's a higher difficulty level. So, I don't know, I was crazy when I was speaking with my psychologist and I said my brain just wants this. I didn't qualify in Thailand, which was okay," he added.
What followed in January was there for everyone to see when Sarvanan confirmed the ticket to Paris, while competing against the cream of the crop. In his sophomore Olympics, Sarvanan is aware of the challenges he will face in France. "The biggest challenge would be the conditions because it's so random. If you see the map of Marseille, it is like a marine drive, but with cliffs on the edges. When the wind comes in different directions, it's very challenging. I have to have a good start and a tactical advantage. That will be the most challenging part where the conditions would be much more difficult and different from other venues like Australia or Tokyo. It will be quite a nice challenge because there will be a lot of ups and downs," the sailor mentioned.
Saravanan is living by the words of Tennis legend Billie Jean King: Pressure is a Privilege. And he has earned it. With less than 50 days left for the Olympics, he would want to use that pressure to win himself a medal.