Time was when sailing was misunderstood to be a protected preserve of the armed forces. Students from the Telangana Sports School (TSS) changed all that with a sterling display in the Laser Sailing Championship in the Hussain Sagar recently.
The Telangana State Sports School (TSSS) would perhaps be most proud of the performance of its past pupil Koteshwar Rao. Sailing for the Trishna Sailing Club, Bangalore this time, he finished fourth overall in the Laser 4.7 category. In the under 16 years section, the silver medal was his.
Last year he had claimed bronze in the same event. Shortly before the Laser championship, he won the Monsoon Regatta gold.
“He was basically from the weightlifting team but became very active during sailing practice. From eighth place in the 2013 Nationals, he finished fifth in the India International Regatta in Chennai in a fleet of over 60 sailors from all over,” recalled TSSS coach Mithun Chakravarthi.
Nagarjuna started in 2013. Placed ninth in the Inland Nationals, he finished eighth at Chennai. Originally selected for football, he moved to sailing. Guruvaiah learnt sailing in just 10 days. In the first race of the recently concluded meet, he was placed 12th. He dropped to 15th, 19th and finished 23rd overall. Other promising sailors from the said institution are Rajesh Naik, Shivram, Ganesh, Sai Kumar and Akhil Reddy.
The school's director K. Narasaiah has been quite encouraging as is Sports Authority of Telangana State (SATS) VC & MD Dinakar Babu. The sport got a fillip under Principal Secretary Luv Agarwal.
While all the students knew swimming, an essential qualification for sailing, one fear they had was of skin diseases they could get from the highly polluted Hussain Sagar, scene of most of the action. Many of them sharpened their skills thanks to coaching by P. Madhu and D.P. Selvam, former national sailors. The sailing camp preceding the championship, conducted by the EMESA, backed by necessary infrastructure and safety measures, also proved highly beneficial.