India’s greatest wrestling talent: Sushil Kumar
A few years ago, wrestling in India was not taken too seriously. Wrestlers from other countries would feel that the Indian wrestlers were an easy win. Then something changed, a young man by the name of Sushil Kumar entered the picture. He is India’s premier
wrestler and has recently won a gold medal for his country in the 66kg weight category.
Over the years he has steadily improved his performance and he now looks unstoppable. The entire team of Indian wrestlers has done very well in the last few years and the sport seems to be making a comeback in the country. India really has something to look
forward to in Sushil and the sport of wrestling.
Kumar was born in 1983 into a wrestling family. His father was a former traditional Indian wrestler and his cousin Sandeep was a promising young talent. With Sushil entering the picture and showing a lot of raw talent, his cousin decided to quit the sport
because the family could only support one wrestler at the time.
Sushil started formal training to become a wrestler at the age of 14. His initial training period was very tough and saw him endure a harsh exercise and preparation regime, but it seems to have paid off. Under the guidance of his coach he became state champion
four years later.
By 1998, the young wrestler started to find early success. Two gold medals came his way while he was competing at the junior level of the sport. He won one of them in 1998 at the World Cadet Games and the next one in 2000 at the Asian Wrestling Championship.
The budding wrestling talent was able to move to the senior level of the sport and became a professional after a three year period of training and developing his skills.
Right after turning professional he surprised a lot of people by competing in the Asian Wrestling Championships and winning a bronze medal. Also in 2003, he went one step further and won his first professional gold medal at the Commonwealth Wrestling Championships.
He could not keep up with his spectacular form of the last few years and 2004 was not a good year for the wrestler. He slipped in the rankings at the Olympic Games in Athens and then had to slowly regain his form. During the next three years he worked extremely
hard and it seemed to pay off.
He managed to win gold medals in 2005 and 2007 and he also managed to secure a bronze medal at the 2008 Beijing Olympics. This really made people stand up and take notice of him, in his own country and internationally.
Two years later at the 2010 World Wrestling Championships, which were held in Moscow, Kumar became the first Indian to ever win a gold medal at these championships and it propelled him into wrestling superstardom in India.
He entered the 2010 Commonwealth Games, being held in his native city of Delhi, as the firm favourite and proved it by defeating Heinrich Barnes of South Africa to win the gold medal. A lot of people were expecting him to win gold and that shows the level
that wrestling has risen in India over the last few years. The situation was similar during the 1980s, when the Indian wrestling team was quite strong and crowds would come out to cheer the players on. This year, even though they had the home crowd advantage,
a large number of people came to cheer for Sushil during his matches.
The 27-year old wrestler has been working very hard on his fitness and his moves in training for the last year or so and he has shown a marked improvement and has taken it to a new level in the sport. For the other competitors out there, he will be the one
to beat now and all eyes will be on this talented Indian in the future.
It is interesting to see that in just a few years Sushil has managed to become a star in his home country and around the World. With a great coaching staff and endless determination and heart, the Delhi native will now look to the future and see what he
can achieve next. It seems his cousin, Sandeep, made the right decision to quit the sport and let Sushil take over the family tradition, he has made them and his whole nation proud as a result.
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