How a 61-year-old jumped his way to glorious win

Time of India

11 hours ago

It's 4 pm. The football ground at Dadar Parsi Colony Gymkhana smells of early rain. Empty after the locality's recently-concluded tournament, a damp sandpit hints at the maidan's other athletic uses—long jump, triple jump.
But as 61-year-old Fareez Vasania points out, there's no high jump mattress. The nearest one is in Bandra. In other words, forget it.
No one would guess this long-haired former advertising professional, who spends his days sprinting, hopping, jumping and playing billiards when not riding his BMW bike, recently returned with not one but three gold medals. A few days ago, his hamstrung calves propelled him nearly five feet off the ground in Taiwan—landing him on top of the podium in high jump, long jump and triple jump at the World Masters Games (WMG), aka 'Olympics for Seniors'.
Hosted jointly by Taipei and New Taipei City between May 17 and 31, the WMG attracted over 25,000 athletes from more than a hundred countries. Open to anyone aged 30 and above, the event champions "lifelong sport." "It's no joke," Vasania warns. "Some of the participants are former Olympians. So, you've got to be on the ball."
Seated at his second home—the Gymkhana—Vasania gets up to receive handshakes and warm hugs. His medals sit proudly in a showcase at home, but his presence here says more than any hardware.
by Taboola
by Taboola
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"I won my first trophy here in 1969," he smiles, remembering his 1500m long-distance race win as a five-year-old. Sport runs in his blood. Vasania's feisty mother, Zarine, was among India's first female motorcyclists. "She'd drop me to school on a scooter," he says.
His father, Aspi, was a boxer—calm and dashing. "Here's my handsome dad," he says, enlarging a black-and-white close-up photo.
After his parents separated, Vasania often bunked Christchurch School in Byculla.
Boarding school in Nainital and later Panchgani reignited his love for sports. "We played everything—badminton, football, hockey..." Later, while working at his father's ad agency, he'd leave daily at 4.45 PM to train. A professional footballer for Air India, Vasania, then a Maradona fan, gave up the sport because of "politics" and began training kids at the Gymkhana.
He was 44 years old when his friend and fellow athlete Rohinton Mehta encouraged him to join WMG.
Back then, both paid over two lakhs each to travel to Sydney, shelling out nearly 30,000 just in participation fees. "I didn't know what to expect but I went with an open mind and relied on my football fitness," recalls Vasania, who returned with a silver in his favourite event: triple jump. "In triple jump, you must hop, step, jump—each with specific footwork," he says.
"It's like a dance."
Under the expert guidance of coach Kelly Pardiwala, physios Hemali Mehta and Dr Mohammed Khan, and masseur Ramchandra, Vasania practised year-round.
He placed eighth in Italy in 2013 ("the weather was not in favour of us tropics guys"), and a close miss in 2017 at New Zealand meant he came home with bronze in triple jump. Then came Taipei, where he stunned even himself with his first gold in his least-practised sport: high jump.
Bereft of cricket's glamour, the discipline attracts few funders. This year, his only sponsor was the Bombay Parsi Panchayet. Unlike 2009, when he was the oldest in his five-year age category at 44, silver-haired Vasania was among the youngest this time at 60.
In the run-up to WMG, the usually non-superstitious Vasania even booked a hotel called Champion. It worked. He clinched high jump gold on his first attempt, then long jump with a 4.84m leap, and finally triple jump—his pièce de résistance.
But it wasn't easy. In March, during a national meet in Bengaluru, he pulled his hamstring and was advised to rest. "That rest did wonders," he admits. He skipped several attempts in Taipei.
That single 10.43m triple jump earned him the third gold. His personal best? A massive 12.24m at the Asian Games in Malaysia.
A photo shows him in a self-designed India jersey, flanked by two towering Germans. Though players at WMG represent themselves, not their countries, he chose to sport the Ashoka Chakra and wave the flag. "We need less politics, more physios and doctors," says Vasania. "Sports bodies are too caught up in money madness."
If he wins the lottery, he says he'd train national-level athletes. What's next? The Asia Masters in Tamil Nadu in November. "Only thing left now is to break a few records.
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