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Yeah. That's me.
Uh that is Pangong Tso Lake, a frozen
Pangong Tso Lake
uh at 4,500 m altitude in India.
And this is the story about an ice
skater from India to the world and back.
I was born in Gujarat, Ahmedabad.
Uh and was born in a family of athletes,
sports persons.
I'm a third generation athlete
who wanted to go and, you know,
put India on the world map for a sport.
My father and my grand and my mother and
all of them said that the one thing
which people cannot take away from you
is your achievements of of um sports,
you know.
Uh so, yeah, that's my dad. Uh he was a
national champion for India, and my aunt
uh used to be also a national champion
for 10 years for roller skating. Uh and
my grandfather used to play hockey with
Major Dhyan Chand Ji. So, I think over
the years I grew up in a household with
a lot of sport sports memorabilia in the
house. Uh so, it was obvious that I was
going to pursue sports.
Uh at some point of time I picked up
roller skating. Uh went on to win the
national gold, uh got selected in the
Indian team, got a Sardar Patel Award of
Excellence from the Gujarat state.
But all of that wasn't enough.
Uh in 2008, I packed my bags and moved
to Europe to pursue the impossible dream
of becoming an ice skater at the Winter
Olympics for India.
Now,
one of my friends in the Netherlands, he
said he told me, "Vishwaraj,
you need to be slightly mad to pursue
this because culturally
in your language, there's only one word
for ice and snow, baraf."
So, how do you come up with this? I was
like, "Yeah, maybe I'm a little fanatic.
I don't know, but the motivation
the motivation and the leap to do
something which was never done before
was always there. And yeah, so we began.
I went from India to the Netherlands and
back to the Himalayas because that was
where I found myself again. Over a
period of time, over a period of 18
years, everything which you could have
imagined could have gone wrong in this
journey has gone wrong twice. But still
standing,
still here. Netherlands where is I long
track speed skating to the Netherlands
is like cricket to India. So, that was
an obvious choice. So that, you know,
when you go there, people would
understand what you want to do, how you
want It's like somebody wanting to come
and play cricket in India.
I met a very interesting coach. He's
been with me for the last 18 years
helping me, guiding me through this
challenging
and one of the most difficult sports out
there. His name is Wim Nieuwenhuizen.
Together, we've seen the world and we've
done a lot of crazy things.
Every day in an athlete's life, in an
elite athlete's life, feels impossible
because it is challenging.
But the curiosity
the curio You need your You need to have
your curiosity
which will constantly keep you going.
Answer enough questions, you will get
somewhere. But over a period of time,
obviously it gets taxing on your body.
I've broken most of my bones in my body,
I had a concussion a couple of times,
but the idea was there's no giving up
and there's no going back.
Wim always said,
"You know, if you're coming all the way
from India to to my sport, I'm crazy
enough to coach you. And we began.
Over a period of 18 years, I've
represented India for 300 races, over 70
national records, and eight
international medals.
Uh
and obviously I missed out on the Winter
Olympics.
That was okay. It was a tough pill to
tough pill to swallow, but that is life.
But I learned a lot,
uh learned how not to make how not to do
something at least, because we've tried
everything which out there.
So eventually at some point I found
myself figuring out what to do next.
And I ended up in the Himalayas again.
To find myself, to understand what is
next,
uh how to do this.
And then I ended up ice skating on this
big frozen piece of land. Cuz there was
nobody. It was minus 30, minus 40 at
times. And I made the world's highest 5
km in India. Which was another
fascinating situation to be in.
So now you might wonder what happens
next.
Now I'm mentoring uh the next generation
of athletes
to go
to their next level. And I will make
sure that they're never told it's not
enough.
So in my mentorship program recently,
finally we won some medals at the
nationals. Uh the kids are here. So
which is very nice to hear know.
So I think the system is working and if
you have motivation, uh anything is
possible. You answer enough questions,
sky is the limit. And and how can uh sky
be the limit if there are footsteps on
the moon, you know? So you need to keep
on pushing yourself and that's what
happened. And somehow here I am at IIT,
a college dropout, talking about my
journey. So well, here we go and here we
stand.
Thank you.
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