With hope in their hearts, the country’s best sailors are in Muscat preparing for the Al Mussanah Open Sail Championships being sailed in the Gulf of Oman from April 1 to 4. Some of them have been training under the watchful eyes of coaches in the SailCoach facility in Malta and will be hoping that their hard work will take them to the Olympic Games.
For the record, no Indian has competed in the Olympic Games sailing competition since Nachhatar Johal finished 23rd out of 26 sailors in the One Person Dinghy (Finn) class in 2008. It would be a shot in the arm for the sport if any of those chasing their dreams in Oman win gold in the Al Mussanah Open Sail Championships and gets to the Tokyo Games later this year.
Like all other athletes, they have endured a year’s uncertainty. With the Asian Sailing Championships 2020 being postponed a few times and cancelled, they were left clinging to hope that an Olympic qualifier would be held in the run up to the big-ticket event in Tokyo. Their wishes came true when Oman Sail stepped up to host an Afro-Asian qualifier.
To be sure, the 2018 Asian Games in Jakarta offered a number of Olympic berths, but no Indian was able to attain Olympic qualification Varun Thakkar and KC Ganapathy went the closest by winning bronze medal in the Men’s Skiff 49er class. They had won the Asian Championship at the same venue a few months earlier.
Their eagerness can be gauged from the fact that the pair undertook the responsibility of initiating the work to transport at least 10 boats and their gear from the Abu Dhabi port to Muscat. Their hard work has paid off as word now trickles in that the boats have reached Muscat and the Indians need not have to rent equipment on-site.
Varun Thakkar and KC Ganapathy will have to beat the host’s Waleed Al-Kendi and Musab Al-Hadi to secure the Olympic berth for their 49er boat. The two crews had both logged 43 points each but the Indians got the bronze with five victories in 15 races as against the Omani’s three wins on the Ancol Beach Marina in Jakarta.
Varsha Gautham and Sweta Shervegar won the women’s Skiff 49ers silver medal in the Asian Games but the Madhya Pradesh pair of Ekta Yadav and Ritika Dangi xwill carry India’s hopes in Muscat. Ekta had to endure the Asian Games selection drama and considered quitting the sport but wiser counsel prevailed. They will be up against two pairs each from Hong Kong and China.
Army Yachting Node’s Vishnu Saravanan missed out on the Asian Games as he finished 12th in the Asian Championships but he finished third in the 2019 Laser U-21 World Championships in Split, Croatia. He will be up against Asian games bronze medalist Ryan Lo (Singapore) and others like Keerati Bualong (Thailand), Nicholas Bezy (Hong Kong) and Abdulla Janahi (Bahrain).
Nethra Kumanan was fifth in the Asian Games in Laser Radial class and will be joined in Oman by Vishnu Saravanan’s sister, Ramya Saravanan (EMESA, Secunderabad) and the Asian Games Laser 4.7 class bronze medalist Harshita Tomar (National Sailing School, Bhopal). Yet, at 71st in the World, Nethra Kumanan is the highest ranked Asian competitor in the Laser Radial regatta.
The Indian team:
Men’s Skiff (49er): Varun Thakkar & K. C. Ganapathy (Tamil Nadu), Prince Noble & Manu Francis and Sandeep Jain & Munna Pandit (Army Yachting Node).
Women’s Skiff (49erFX): Ekta Yadav & Ritika Dangi (National Sailing School, Bhopal)/
Men’s One-Person Dinghy (Laser): Vishnu Saravanan, Mohit Saini and Gitesh Nain (Army Yachting Node), Avinash Yadav, Ajay Rajput, Upamanyu Datta, Ram Milan Yadav.
Women’s One-Person Dinghy (Laser Radial): Nethra Kumanan (Tamil Nadu), Ramya Saravanan (EMESA, Secunderabad), Harshita Tomar (National Sailing School, Bhopal) and Jayalakshmi Sundaravadivel.
Men’s windsurfer RS:X: Eabad Ali (Army Yachting Node).
Women’s windsurfer RS:X: Ishwariya Ganesh (Tamil Nadu).
Image: KC Ganapathy (left) and Varun Thakkar after they won the 2018 Asian Games bronze medal in Jakarta
