Hard work beats talent when talent doesn't work hard: Saina Nehwal
If you thought badminton icon Saina Nehwal 's secret was talent gifted by the gods, think again. The former World No. 1, who recently spoke at a school, served up a masterclass not just in sport, but in grit, graft and good old-fashioned gumption. What followed was an hour of refreshingly honest, often humorous insights into the making of India's shuttling superstar. Here's how Saina smashed stereotypes and inspired a hall packed with students—and perhaps a few bashful adults too.
From Haryana to Hyderabad: Destiny with a side of discipline
'I didn't set out to be anything. I just loved working hard,' Saina said, recalling how life changed overnight when her father got a promotion and the family moved from Haryana to Hyderabad. What started as a girl simply playing for fun turned into a journey of endless bus rides, crack-of-dawn wake-up calls, and training miles away from home. There was no master plan, no prophecy—just a mother's unwavering belief. 'My mother decided I'd be an Olympian when I was nine. I laughed. She didn't.' It turns out mum knew best.
More than talent, tenacity matters
Saina is under no illusion about her path. 'I'm not someone like Federer or Tiger Woods. I didn't have that kind of wrist. So I decided, if they train six hours, I'll train ten.' If there was ever a philosophy to pin on your wall (or locker), this was it. Her daily grind involved 25-km commutes (twice a day), training, school, more training. Sleep, repeat. And somewhere in that blur of shuttles and sweat, history was made: Super Series titles, World Championship medals, Olympic glory.
The Steffi Graf connection
Before badminton, there was karate. 'I'm a brown belt, but getting hit every day wasn't fun at eight,' Saina confessed with a grin. Cue mum's love for tennis and Steffi Graf, and Saina's eventual nickname—Steffi. 'In Haryana, they still call me Steffi,' she laughed. Her entry into badminton was as accidental as it was magical. 'The first shot I played was a smash. Even I was shocked!' Fate, it seems, had a wicked sense of timing.
The hidden cost of each medals
Behind the medals stood sacrifices most can only imagine. The family took loans to afford equipment and air tickets so Saina could compete without the fatigue of long train journeys. 'My father never let me see the struggles until I was 18,' she shared. And yet, even as she rose through the ranks, Saina never let comfort dull her hunger. From ice baths she loathed to missing movies and shopping trips, it was all part of the package. 'You hate everything at some point—the routine, the sacrifices—but when you're on that podium, nothing else matters.'
Beating the boys, not chasing the stars
Role models? 'I didn't have any. I just wanted to beat the boys in training,' she said. While the world fawned over sports idols, Saina's world was simpler: work harder, run longer, lift heavier. Only later did she become a fan of Roger Federer and Serena Williams. But if you ask her about her ultimate inspiration, she doesn't blink: 'My mom. She was the one who believed first.'
Box: From Badshah to India's President: Saina's unforgettable matches
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
India Today
24 minutes ago
- India Today
Indian delegation visits Olympic headquarters in major push for 2036 hosting dreams
A high-level Indian delegation is currently in Lausanne, Switzerland, on a key three-day visit to the headquarters of the International Olympic Committee (IOC), underscoring the country's resolve to pursue its ambitious bid to host the 2036 Summer Olympics. This marks India's first official visit to the Olympic capital since expressing formal interest in hosting the Games last by Gujarat Sports Minister Harsh Sanghvi, the delegation includes Indian Olympic Association (IOA) President PT Usha, Sports Association Secretary Hariranjan Rao, Gujarat Chief Sports Secretary Ashwini Kumar, and Urban Secretary Thennarasan. The visit comes just days after newly elected IOC President Kirsty Coventry announced a 'pause and review' of the host city selection process — a move that casts uncertainty over timelines but not over India's current Indian team is holding consultations with various international sporting bodies, aiming to showcase Gujarat — the proposed host region — as a viable destination for mega sporting events. India had submitted its Letter of Intent to the IOC in October 2023, with its bid being championed by IOC member Nita Ambani and publicly supported by Prime Minister Narendra Modi. "Yesterday I had a fruitful meeting with the President of SportAccord, a Lausanne-based global sports event organisation. Gujarat was invited to host the SportAccord conference in Gujarat, which will showcase Gujarat's potential as a major sports event destination. We had detailed discussions with Team Berson on international sports tournament presentations and explored opportunities for collaboration and growth," Sanghvi delegation also held discussions with representatives from the Association of National Olympic Committees (ANOC), which includes 206 National Olympic Committees under the IOC umbrella. 'Our sports infrastructure and hospitality were highlighted in this meeting,' Sanghvi meetings with the International Volleyball Federation focused on exploring opportunities to host major tournaments and to further develop the sport in India. These engagements mark an important step in positioning India as a hub for international sporting events, while strengthening partnerships with global sports organisations. Courtesy: India Today These engagements continue even as President Coventry's recent remarks indicate a possible shift in the IOC's approach to selecting Olympic hosts. Speaking after her first Executive Board meeting last week, she revealed plans to form a working group to evaluate the process — one that had previously fast-tracked Brisbane for the 2032 Games under Thomas Bach's presidency, bypassing traditional bids.'There was overwhelming support from the IOC members for a pause and a review of the host election process,' Coventry said. 'We want all interested parties to be part of this review. I am aware of the Indian delegation visiting this week — that will continue. They might be the first interested party from whom we'll seek input.'Despite the temporary uncertainty, India's campaign continues to build international goodwill. The country's last major multi-sport hosting was the 2010 Commonwealth Games in New Delhi, and there is a growing sense that India is ready for a bigger Minister Modi has repeatedly underscored India's Olympic aspirations, noting the broader national significance of bringing the Games to a country that has never hosted them.'We are pushing for hosting rights of the 2036 Olympics — it will take Indian sport to new heights. Wherever Olympics happen, all sectors gain," he had said.- EndsMust Watch
Indian Express
41 minutes ago
- Indian Express
Ex-World Champion Vladimir Kramnik, ‘the guy with the hammer who thinks everything is a nail'
It's been a long few days in the world of chess. The issue of cheating in the sport is back in the headlines with a former world champion accusing another grandmaster of being up to no good. Courts have been dragged in to adjudicate with one player suing the other for slander. Only, this time around, there's a twist: unlike the Magnus Carlsen vs Hans Niemann incident, where Niemann sued the former world champion for implying that he had cheated, this time around it's former world champion Vladimir Kramnik who is doing both, the accusing and the suing, after dragging grandmaster David Navara to court. This is the latest step taken by Kramnik in his infamous crusade to weed out cheating in online chess, a fight that the Russian seems to have dedicated significant mindspace to over the last couple of years. Kramnik posts data on his X account implying that there was something fishy in the way many grandmasters were competing in online games. It's a fight that has gained Kramnik no admirers, at least not publicly. The most recent grandmaster to try and coax Kramnik to see the light of reason is Levon Aronian, who's now posted three long emotion-laced posts on X aimed at a man who he calls his 'chess parent', each post displaying the delicate tact a hostage negotiator would ideally employ. 'Volodya, my friend,' Aronian exhorts in one of his posts on X aimed at Kramnik using the Slavic name for Vladimir. 'Perhaps my letter will seem disrespectful and inappropriate to you. But my goal is one. Let's reduce the intensity of passions… You think you're saving chess from cheaters. But most of us see you as the guy with the hammer who thinks everything is a nail,' Aronian says at one point. Over the course of his three posts, Aronian tries multiple tacts. Telling Kramnik that he's a great champion and amateurs do not deserve the attention he's given them in his YouTube breakdowns ('the king of beasts is engaged in catching mice'). Trying to convince Kramnik how much the world would benefit from an analysis of his own tactics from his world championship duels instead. Reminding the Russian how he was himself bullied by Veselin Topalov and his team, who accused Kramnik of being up to no good because he visited the toilet too many times (an incident known popularly as Toiletgate) during their World Championship battle in 2006. Trying to reason with him by saying that the sport is a family and kin cannot go around suing each other. And finally, telling him that no one who's close to him in the sport thinks what Kramnik is doing is 'good and pure'. 'Chess world does not appreciate you enough… I feel the chess world and the new generation need to know about you… about who you are,' Aronian writes at one point. 'And I want you to remember it as well.' There, Aronian praises the Russian for being the 'biggest revolutionary when it comes to chess… who challenged every single dogma' in the sport. That's precisely how chess fans of a certain vintage will remember the Russian. As the man who resuscitated the abandoned Berlin Defence at the 2000 World Championship to nullify the attack of Kasparov so completely that the reigning world champion, with a voracious appetite for bulldozing through defences, ended with zero wins. He was the immovable object in front of Kasparov's unstoppable force of an attack. He could fluster Kasparov, the most intimidating man in the sport. Kramnik was built differently. When he first emerged on the global stage at the Manila Olympiad in 1992 rocking long hair, spectacles, a tucked in short-sleeved shirt, the tall Kramnik looked like a rockstar cosplaying as a laboratory assistant. If Kasparov, his predecessor on the world champion's throne, vroomed to a game in a Mercedes, Kramnik probably took the bus. He was always outspoken and an independent thinker, even if it meant rubbing people the wrong way. He was never quite taken in by the trappings that come along with being world champion. Like fame or money. What the world thought about him was also never a concern. 'For me, what I think of myself is more important than what society thinks. That may sound arrogant, but I have my own views and don't care about the views of the public,' Kramnik told the editor of New In Chess magazine before he squared off against Kasparov in 2000. 'My approach to chess is different. For most other chess players, chess is purely a sport, for me, it's more of a scientific activity.' It's this ability to stay unmoved by the world's perception of him that helped him retain his title against Topalov when the Bulgarian and his entourage tried to raise questions about his own integrity in the Toiletgate scandal. It's also what's helping him stay on course with his current allegations of cheating in chess despite the rest of the world disagreeing with him. Before Topalov in 2006, it was the 2000 world championship battle against Kasparov that established Kramnik's place in history. Not just as Kasparov's nemesis or his antithesis. He was Kasparov's kryptonite, a man who would beat the Russian legend, who was actually his mentor at the Botvinnik-Kasparov School, and then shrug it off as no big deal. Unlike others, beating Kasparov was not an achievement for him. 'It has always surprised me when people get so hung up about a victory over Kasparov,' he once told New in Chess when he was just 21, not even a world champion. 'Then it seems as if it happened by accident. I don't believe I defeated Kasparov by accident. The idea that Kasparov is so exceptional is a myth created by journalists.' In the same interview, Kramnik proceeded to go on multiple tirades. There was one rant about chess becoming too commercial. Then, another rant about how the chess players of his generation were playing 'substandard' chess. At some point he says that he wasn't a good player, but other players were even worse. Now compare those comments to the ones he made about Gukesh and Ding Liren during last year's world championship, where he excoriated both players for their level of chess. Those criticisms earned him the wrath of the two most populous nations of the world. But for Kramnik, he was probably just measuring both players by the standards he set for himself in his playing days. A few years after that interview about chess becoming too commercial, he finds himself facing Kasparov in that 2000 World Championship where the prize fund is an eye-watering $2 million. A 24-year-old Kramnik responds to that by declaring that he would have played for free. At another point in his career, when he played Peter Leko in 2004 for the title, Kramnik came under some criticism for playing out short draws. In an interview, it was put to him that the fans would have wanted to see more chess. It was then that he memorably exclaimed: 'A painter never asks people what they want to see. He just paints.' Even with his chess, as with his opinions and convictions, Kramnik was not playing to the gallery. He was playing chess as he deemed fit. The world may criticise him as a man with a hammer hell-bent on hitting every nail on its head. But there can be no reduction in the intensity of his passions.
&w=3840&q=100)
Business Standard
an hour ago
- Business Standard
Kishore Jena pulls out of NC Classic due to injury, Yashvir to replace him
Struggling with an ankle injury, Kishore Jena has pulled out of Saturday's Neeraj Chopra Classic international javelin event and will be replaced by Yashvir Singh, the organisers announced on Monday. The 23-year-old Yashvir had finished second in the Federation Cup in April and fifth in the Asian Athletics Championships in South Korea in May with a personal best of 82.57m. "Kishore Jena has been ruled out of the Neeraj Chopra Classic 2025 due to an ankle injury. Yashvir Singh has been named as his replacement in the final lineup," the organisers of NC Classic said in an official update. On June 6, Poland's Martin Konecny had replaced Asian Games bronze medallist Genki Dean of Japan as the organisers confirmed the 12-man entry list for the rescheduled event. India's first-ever international javelin competition, originally slated for May 24, was postponed due to military tensions between India and Pakistan. Organised by double Olympic medallist Neeraj Chopra in collaboration with JSW Sports and sanctioned by the Athletics Federation of India (AFI), the event will feature a world-class field comprising seven top international throwers and five Indian athletes, including Chopra himself. Apart from Konecny, the confirmed international lineup includes two-time world champion Anderson Peters (Grenada), 2016 Olympic gold medallist Thomas Rhler (Germany), 2015 world champion Julius Yego (Kenya), Curtis Thompson (USA), Luiz Mauricio da Silva (Brazil), and Rumesh Pathirage (Sri Lanka). The Indian contingent will feature Asian Championships silver medallist Sachin Yadav, Rohit Yadav, and Sahil Silwal. Initially set to be held in Panchkula, the event has been relocated to the Sree Kanteerava Stadium in Bengaluru due to lighting limitations at the original venue that affected live telecast capabilities. The event, granted Category A status by World Athletics, is considered a "dream project" of Chopra and aims to establish India as a credible host of elite-level athletics events. It had to be postponed following the terror attack in Pahalgam that claimed the lives of 26 civilians, including several tourists. According to the organisers, ticket prices will range from Rs 199 to Rs 9,999. Premium experiences include five corporate boxes, each accommodating 15 guests, priced at Rs 44,999. A special stand next to the thrower's runway is available for Rs 9,999, while another premium section in the North Upper Stand, just behind the runway, is priced at Rs 2,999. (Only the headline and picture of this report may have been reworked by the Business Standard staff; the rest of the content is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)
