With the outlook of women in sports changing in our country, more and more young sportswomen are making it to the top with the right training, diet and dedication. The real credit goes to the Indian sportswomen who are the real motivation behind changing the face of women in sports. Lets take a look at them:
1. PV Sindhu:
PV Sindhu is an Indian professional badminton player, who is currently world no. 5 in the BWF World Ranking. At the 2016 Summer Olympics, she became the first Indian woman to win an Olympic silver medal. She is one of the two Indian badminton players to ever win an Olympic medal – other being Saina Nehwal.
Workout: Sindhu’s fitness trainer Kiran Challagundle told Hindustan times, keeping full eyes on the importance of her legs, special fitness plan was followed by Sindhu for Olympics. Fitness regime was different. Running was her main exercise to strengthen her legs. Power-run for 2 to 3 km were followed and pushed till 10 km run. Different fitness training were given to Sindhu like the tempo run, ladder run, etc.
Apart from working on her badminton technique, Sindhu’s daily schedule includes yoga, pranayama, running, and swimming. And she does at least 100 push-ups and 200 sit-ups every single day!
Diet: Much has been made of coach Gopichand’s ban on junk food and sweets from Sindhu’s diet in the run up to the Games. But it’s elementary to him: “The sugar hampers recovery, it causes inflammation,” says Gopi.
There’s constant supervision and each meal is measured out. “A challenge that we have with Sindhu is that her appetite is very less. We monitor each meal and give her high calorie food when she’s not feeling hungry enough,” says Kiran.
That’s also why the supplements are key. “Even during the Games she has been carrying three types of nutrition supplements in her bag. These vary – high energy, protein-based or recovery inducing.” They can be fluid based or energy bars.
2. Geeta Phogat:
Geeta Phogat is a freestyle wrestler who won India’s first ever gold medal in wrestling at the Commonwealth Games in 2010. She is also the first Indian female wrestler to have qualified for the Olympic Summer Games.
Workout: Her daily workout session starts with waking up at 3:30 every morning, a glass of water, jogging, stretching and then she is on ground by 4 AM. Then practicing in arena for continuous 2.5 hour and after school again practicing for 2.5 hour in evening. Indeed today her daily workout has changed but practicing the hardest way hasn’t altered a bit.
Diet: Her diet includes daily four times pre & post workout meal.
Morning: Sprouted grains, fruits, juice, green veggies salad, soybean, curd, occasional aloo-parantha.
Lunch: Daal, chicken, veggies and salad, buttered chapatti, curd, etc.
Evening: Fruits and Milk.
Dinner: Buttered chapatti, dal, salad, chicken, Milk and curd, etc.
Beside she takes daily 150 almonds and hasn’t eaten junk food for the last 15 years.
3. Sakshi Malik:
Sakshi Malik is an Indian freestyle wrestler. At the 2016 Summer Olympics, she won the bronze medal in the 58 kg category, becoming the first Indian female wrestler to win a medal at the Olympics and the fourth female Olympic medalist from the country.
Workout: A daily routine for Sakshi’s includes 500 sit-ups and intense training.
Diet: Her daily diet includes almonds and sprouts. She always prefers cow’s milk. Her daily diet chart includes milk, almonds, sprouted food, fruits, vegetables, raisins, soybean, pulses, pomegranate and sweet lime juice and non-veg food.
4. Akanksha Singh:
Akanksha Singh is the current captain of India Women’s National Basketball Team. She is the member of national women team since 2004 to till date. In 2010, Akanksha was awarded the Most Valuable Player in India’s first Professional Basketball league, MBPL 2010. Her name then, went on to be forever cemented in the Indian Basketball history books as one of the first ever Top Four Players to achieve the “A Grade” from the Basketball Federation of India sponsored by IMG Reliance. Popularly called by the name of small wonder in Basketball.
5. Deepika Kumari:
Deepika Kumari is an Indian athlete who competes in the event of Archery, is currently ranked World No. 5, and is a former world number one. She won a gold medal in the 2010 Commonwealth games in the women’s individual recurve event. She was conferred the Arjuna Award, India’s second highest sporting award in the year 2012 by President of India Pranab Mukherjee.
In February 2014, she was honored with FICCI Sportsperson of the Year Award. The Government of India awarded her the civilian honour of the Padma Shri in 2016.
In 2014, Deepika was featured by Forbes (India) as one of their ’30 under 30′.
In November 2015, she won a bronze medal in the Asian Championships with Jayanta Talukdar in the Recurve Mixed Team event.
In April 2016, at the first stage of the World Cup in Shanghai, Deepika equaled the Ki Bo-bae’s world record of (686/720) in the women’s recurve event. Deepika Kumari was also part of the team that qualified for 2016 Rio Olympics.
6. Dipika Pallikal:
Dipika Pallikal Karthik is an Indian squash player. She is the first Indian to break into the top 10 in the PSA Women’s rankings. Dipika came to prominence in 2011, when she won three WISPA tour titles to attain a career-best ranking of 13th. She broke into the top 10 in December 2012.
Workout: She regularly uses the gym to stay fit. Running is also an important part of her lifestyle. Even during her summer holidays, she likes to go for a run or cycle a bit.
Diet: Dipika believes in eating healthy to stay healthy, but also allows herself to indulge in chocolates once in a while. Drinking as much water as you can is her go-to tip.
7. Dipa Karmakar:
Dipa Karmakar is an artistic gymnast, who represented India at the 2016 Summer Olympics. She is the first bengali as well as Indian female gymnast ever to compete in the Olympics, and the first Indian gymnast to do so in 52 years. She attained 4th position in Women’s Vault Gymnastics event of Rio Olympics 2016 with an overall score of 15.066. She is recipient of Padma Shri, the fourth highest civilian award in the Republic of India.
Workout: Discipline is what Dipa swears by. “I wake up at 7am and then go down to the mess for breakfast at 8am. After that, it’s practice time from 8.30 in the morning till 12 noon. I return to my room, freshen up and rush for lunch at 1pm. It’s again time to take some rest and recover by sleeping till 3.30 pm,” said Dipa.
This is not the end of training for the petite-yet-muscular gymnast. The next round of training session for her begins at 4.30 pm. “The practice session ends at 8.30 pm, after which I eat my dinner and call it a day,” said Dipa.
Diet: It’s a protein-packed diet for the international gymnast.” My diet schedule includes more of chicken. For breakfast, I eat egg, dalia, chana and a glass of milk. For lunch again, I have a couple of pieces of boiled chicken. For dinner, I only eat chicken and a vegetable soup. This is the diet I have been following not just after my qualification for the Rio Olympics but for years now,” said Dipa.
“I can’t eat anything else as such, as the burden of compensation becomes bigger,” she adds. Although, on the weekends, she does get some respite. “On the weekends at the hostel, we do get a little bit of variety. But then again, it has to be a variety of chicken. We get chicken pakoras to eat at the mess on Saturdays, and on Sundays, the special treat includes fried eggs,” said Dipa. Another treat she has to give up are the sweet cravings she has rather often.
In between the training session, Dipa replenishes the loss of electrolytes and energy by munching on dry fruits and sipping on juices and energy drinks. On asking whether she ever gets a treat from her coach on performing well, pat comes Dipa’s matter-of-fact reply, “I get only whatever suits my body”. But there is something she is really fond of eating and doesn’t get to eat in Delhi. Watch her talk about the one dish that makes her mouth water, and it’s NOT chicken:
8. Mithali Raj:
Mithali Dorai Raj is an Indian cricketer and the captain of the Indian Women’s cricket team in Tests and ODI. Often regarded as one of the greatest cricketing batters to have ever played the game, she is the highest run-scorer in women’s international cricket and the only female cricketer to surpass the 6,000 run mark in ODIs. She is the first player to score 7 consecutive 50s in ODIs. Raj is the first captain (men or women) to lead India to an ICC ODI World Cup final twice – 2005 and 2017.
Workout: She does normal weight training to prepare for the sport.
Diet: She treats herself to occasional sweets which is quite visible on her Instagram.
9. Tania Sachdeva:
Tania Sachdev is an Indian chess player, who holds the FIDE titles of International Master (IM) and Woman Grandmaster (WGM). She is also a chess presenter and commentator. In 2016, Sachdev won the best woman’s prize at the Reykjavik Open and won the Commonwealth women’s champion title in Kalutara.
In 2005, she became the eighth Indian player to be awarded the Woman Grandmaster title. She won India’s National Women’s Premier Chess Championship in 2006 and 2007. In 2007, she also won the Women’s Asian Chess Championship with 6½ points out of nine rounds in Tehran. She was conferred with the prestigious Arjuna Award in 2009.
She has played for the Indian national team in the Women’s Chess Olympiads since 2008, the Women’s World Team Chess Championship in 2009 and 2011, the Women’s Asian Team Chess Championship since 2003, the 2006 Asian Games, and the 2009 Asian Indoor Games. Sachdev won the individual bronze medal for board 3 at the 2012 Women’s Chess Olympiad in Istanbul, four team silver medals (in 2008, 2009, 2012, and 2014) and four individual ones (three silver and one bronze) at the Women’s Asian Team Championship.
Sachdev has presented a Fritztrainer Strategy DVD for Chessbase and was a member of the official commentary team for the 2013 (Chennai) World Championship Match between Magnus Carlsen and Viswanathan Anand.
10. Aditi Ashok:
Aditi Ashok is an Indian professional golfer who took part in the 2016 Summer Olympics. Aditi became the youngest and first Indian to win the Lalla Aicha Tour School and secured her Ladies European Tour card for the 2016 season. This win also made her the youngest winner of a Q School for an international tour. Aditi is the first and the only Indian golfer who played the Asian Youth Games (2013), Youth Olympic Games (2014), Asian Games (2014) and Olympic Games (2016).
Aditi won the 2016 Hero Women’s Indian Open with a score of 3-under-par 213, and in the process became the first Indian to win a Ladies European Tour title. She picked up a second win two weeks later at the Qatar Ladies Open and finished the season second on the Order of Merit. She won the Rookie of the Year award. She also gained a LPGA Tour card for 2017 via the LPGA Final Qualifying Tournament.