When Siva Subramani, the nation’s greatest vaulter by a distance, misplaced his former coach Don Wilcox to Covid in May final 12 months, he thought his profession in athletics was all however over. The ache of dropping Wilcox, a retired customs officer whom Siva calls his spine, was exhausting to course of for the 26-year-old. He not solely misplaced his focus but in addition his will to pursue the game.
“He was my backbone. What will you do if you lose yours?” asks Siva. But the Tamil Nadu athlete knew he needed to decide himself up and proceed vaulting. He couldn’t let his late coach down.
So, it was solely apt that after rewriting his personal nationwide document by clearing the bar at 5.31m and taking house the gold on the ongoing National Games, Siva devoted his medal to his former coach. He clenched the medal in his arms as his eyes went moist whereas saying, “It’s for him. I really miss him.”
Siva has now damaged the nationwide document 4 instances since first disturbing it in 2017.
Siva Subramani (Courtesy: Twitter)
“After he passed away, I just wanted to quit the sport. I was distraught. He was my mentor, coach and backbone. He is the reason why I am a sportsperson today. I owe him everything,” says Siva after his victory on Monday when the remainder of the sphere couldn’t even breach the 5m mark.
Siva’s first interplay with Wilcox virtually looks as if future. Coach Don was heading to the Poondi Madha (Mother Mary) shrine in Thanjavur in his automotive when he glanced at Siva in Kallanai, which is en path to the church.
“I was just taking a stroll with my friends and he saw me. He stopped and asked me if I was a pole vaulter. I recognised him instantly since my brother was a vaulter and I knew about coach Wilcox. He had probably seen my videos on social media,” remembers Siva who was 17 again then.
Siva advised Wilcox that he wish to prepare beneath him and the latter immediately agreed. “He asked me to pack my bags and come to Chennai. He not only trained me for free but took care of me and even gave me money for my expenses there,” says Siva.
In a method, Wilcox adopted {the teenager}. He acquired Siva enrolled on the prestigious Loyola College and even paid his first-year school charges. In the second 12 months, Siva broke the junior nationwide document on the junior Fed Cup, incomes a scholarship on the school.
From water to land
Before starting his tryst with pole vaulting, Siva was a promising swimmer. With no swimming swimming pools in his village, the teenager honed his expertise on the Kallanai dam in Trichy district of Tamil Nadu. One day, Tamilarasan, his elder brother, took Siva to a school meet he was participating in. “It was like magic. The way he (Tamilarasan) leapt over that bar was mesmerising. At that very moment, I decided that I want to take up vaulting,” Siva remembers.
The two-time nationwide open champion is eyeing the distant Asian Games qualification mark of 5.55m subsequent. Siva admits that there’s a large gulf between Indian and worldwide vaulters however desires to bridge it. “I want to break that barrier and create history,” he says.
After Wilcox handed away, his son Gerald, who’s hearing- and speech-impaired, took the mantle to coach his father’s wards, together with Siva. “Coach Gerald follows the same training and workout plan set by Don sir. We are slowly figuring out my flaws and it’s going well,” says Siva.
Communicating with Gerald has by no means been a troublesome process for Siva since Wilcox had already educated him in understanding a variety of gestures. “I have spent a long time with coach Gerald so we know what each other is thinking. He is good at lipreading and I understand his actions clearly. It is not difficult because even coach Don used to use a lot of gestures and actions during training. Because at times during competitions, the coach sits a little far from where yelling is not practical. So, we understand using actions and gestures,” says Siva who stated he would video name Gerald later to point out his medal.
But there isn’t a doubt who would have been the proudest to see Siva’s newest medal. “If Don sir was there, I would have been on a different level. There are a lot of things I miss, but the most would be his scolding. Training le nalla thithuvaru (During training, he used to give me an earful). It helped me a lot to improve. I miss that so much,” says Shiva holding his tears again.
