Andhra Pradesh - Visakhapatnam   

Impressive show by roller skater

Avani Panchal

VISAKHAPATNAM: Avani Panchal, the international roller-skater of the city, returned home with an impressive show in the 54th World junior roller figure skating championships held in Freiburg, Germany, from November 11 to 15.

The young roller-skater, who won the National championship many times and picked up medals in the Asian championships, proved that she was on par with well trained European and other western counterparts as far as techniques in skating were concerned.

In the freestyle competition with 33 other skaters, Avani was in the second place most of the time. The elements performed by all the competitors are the same, and in the technical marks section she could impress the judges very well. But in the artistic impression section, most of the seven judges did not give her sufficient marks. As the MV (Majority Votes) cast by the judges were taken into consideration, Avani started slipping in her rankings and finished 25th.

“There is not much difference between me and the first placed girl, but competitors from western countries lay a lot of stress on choreography and facial expressions, while we concentrate on technical part of our performance. Also, we don’t have the choreography facility. It is here we are lagging behind,” Avani explained abut the competition to The Hindu.

However, a reporter of a German newspaper Badische Zeitung, who saw Avani in her practice session, devoted a good part of the article to her, and also carried a photograph of her.

Initiated into roller-skating and groomed by Akula Pavan Kumar, Avani undergoes training under the foreign coaches engaged by the Roller-skating Federation of India before major international competitions.

Sponsorship is hard to come by for the roller-skaters and government also does not help them much. For the World championship this time, Avani received a help of Rs. 1.10 lakhs from the Vijay Nirman company.

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