School-goers Aswin Abraham and Pranamya Rao IK recently returned home with a gold medal won at the 49th National Artistic Roller Skating Championship. They won the medal in the pair dance category. The result was possible due to a high score of 8.2 in one of the sub events. In fact, such a high score is generally unheard of, says their coach and former skating champion, Aaron Saldanha.The students, Aswin, a class 9 student of SBOA Anna Nagar, and Pranamya, a class 8 student at Bhavan’s Rajaji Vidyashram, participated in the National Competition under the 12-14 age group. The competition ended in Chandigarh last week. The championship included events such as figure skating, freestyle and inline freestyle. Out of the 14 medals bagged by Tamil Nadu, this winning pair brought home six — a bronze each in individual dance and a bronze in pair skating. In fact, in pair skating, their score could have been higher if not for the hand injury Aswin sustained at the last minute. The 14-year-old is however grateful that he managed a place on the podium at all. He recalls, “I had fallen on the ice the day before the competition and my skin had peeled off.” He adds, “So, I managed to skate with a cast after that. However, midway through our pair skating routine, the cast came off and it was pretty bad.” Despite the injury, coach Aaron says the team left the competition high on morale. He states, “The judges were really impressed. In fact, we were told to get them ready for the Asian championships from the very next day onwards!” Notably, this wasn’t the first time both youngsters had participated in a national level-competition. Believe it or not, Pranamya won her first national gold medal at the age of 10! She also won a gold in pair dance last year, with a different partner though. Ask her whether she still gets butterflies before a performance and she responds, “No, not at all.” She smiles, “I’m always cool, it help me stay focussed.”Choreographers Deepak and Muthukrishnan were also part of the team and trained the pair. The three sections of pair dance included a compulsory flirtation waltz, rocker foxtrot and a choice of dance styles such as jazz, hip-hop and Bollywood. While Chennai may have a long way to go in this sport, it seems this winning pair are all set to lead the way. They will soon start preparations for the Asian championships scheduled for October this year in China.
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