From Puri to Glasgow, two gymnasts chase the CWG dream

(From left) Tapan Mohanty, Rakesh Patra and Tapeshwarnath Das in Glasgow As Indian gymnasts begin their Commonwealth Games campaign in Glasgow on Friday, two young athletes from Puri, Orissa, will be looking to make a mark on one of the biggest stages of their careers.Tapan Mohanty and Tapeshwarnath Das started gymnastics at a young age after joining the State Sports Hostel in the coastal city. Watching a sport that still lacks widespread popularity in India has never been easy, but they kept their heads down, trusted the process and are now among the four Indian male gymnasts set to compete at the Commonwealth Games.For Mohanty, making the Commonwealth Games squad is the culmination of years of hard work and the youngster is quietly confident after an encouraging performance at the Asian Championships last month.“It was a great experience and I performed well there. I competed against Olympians and international medalists and learned a lot from watching them prepare and race,” Mohanty said.The gymnast, whose father was a servitor at the Jagannath Temple and a former state-level wrestler, believes competing against the world’s best has also changed his outlook.“Seeing them win medals made me realize that I could do it too. It gave me confidence and reinforced the importance of staying focused and working hard,” he added.A versatile gymnast, Mohanty believes his best chance lies in the floor exercise, where he hopes to qualify for the finals and challenge for a medal. He also represented India at the 2023 Asian Games.Preparing for an event of this magnitude involved weeks of careful planning. After the Asian Championships, the Indian team traveled to Essex, England for a training camp at the South Essex Gymnastics Club under the guidance of coaches Scott Hann and Anthony Wise.For Das, the internship in Essex was invaluable and he believes it will make a significant difference once the competition gets underway in Glasgow.“The facilities are excellent and we train with the same equipment we will use during the competition,” Das said while training there.“We also had enough time to adapt to the weather and conditions here. If we had traveled directly from India, the adaptation would have been much more difficult. Spending more time here really helped our preparation.”Das, a vault specialist, believes training overseas has sharpened his strongest event, which he loves for the power and explosiveness associated with it.“Success in vaulting is all about technique and skill execution, and that’s something I’ve developed over years of consistent training,” he said.In addition to hours of exercise in the gym, both athletes also incorporate meditation into their daily routine to stay mentally balanced. Equally important was the bond they shared as they grew up in the same town and trained together for almost a decade.Years after starting their journeys at the State Sports Hostel in Puri, Das and Mohanty now stand on the brink of the biggest competition of their careers. Along with Rakesh Patra, their senior and now coach, they will be hoping that the trip from Odisha to Glasgow ends with a memorable performance.

• Squad: Men’s Team: Tapan Mohanty, Tapeshwaranath Das, Swathish KP, Yogeshwar Singh
• Women’s Team: Protistha Samanta, Pranati Nayak, Nishka Agarwal, Eshitaa Rewale