Shivani Kataria
Shivani Kataria (born September 27, 1997) is an Indian swimmer who competes in the women's 200m freestyle.[1] She holds many national records and she in unusual to be an Indian woman swimmer at Commonwealth games.
Early life
Shivani hails from Haryana, is born and brought in Gurugram, India and went to DAV Public School.[2] She started swimming at 6 when she used to go to a summer camp at Baba Gang Nath Swimming Centre near her house, hence her interest in swimming developed and her parents were also supportive.[3][4] She started taking part in district level competitions under her first coach Mr. Yadav and won the bronze medal at CBSE nationals in Gujarat.[2] In 2012, she decided she wanted to be a professional swimmer and started swimming two hours in the morning and two in the evening along with an hour of core exercises during the day.[2]
Career
Shivani made massive strides since 2013, she finished sixth in the 200m freestyle at the 2013 Asian Youth Championships and she won a gold medal at the 2016 South Asian Games.[1] In 2015, she trained for an year at the FINA camp at Thyanpura in Phuket, Thailand, [3][5] where she was swimming thrice a day. She clocked 2:04:00 in that camp and was closest to a time slot level, called the B Cart, which made her believe that she could represent India at the 2016 Summer Olympics in Brazil.[2]
2016 Summer Olympics
Shivani was selected as India's wildcard entry for the Rio Olympics by the Swimming Federation of India (SFI) president, Digambar Kamat,[1] making her the first Indian women to swim in the Summer Olympics after 2004 in Athens.[3] She competed at the 2016 Summer Olympics in the women's 200 metre freestyle event; her time of 2:09.30 in the heats did not qualify her for the semifinals. She holds most of the Indian national records. She was India's first female Olympic swimmer since the 2004 Summer Olympics.[6] Shivani sees the 2016 Olympics qualification more as a learning curve which will strengthen her chances in the 2020 Olympics.[4]
References
- ^ a b c "Road to Rio: Shivani Kataria, first Indian woman swimmer at the Olympics after 2004". Firstpost. 2016-07-29. Retrieved 2017-05-13.
- ^ a b c d "Interview with Indian swimmer Shivani Kataria: "Reaching semi-finals in 2016 Rio Olympics would be historic"". 2016-07-26. Retrieved 2017-05-13.
- ^ a b c "The Story Of Shivani Kataria - India's First Female Olympic Swimmer In 12 Years". indiatimes.com. Retrieved 2017-05-13.
- ^ a b "Shivani Kataria: India's first woman swimmer at Olympics in12 years". SheThePeople TV. Retrieved 2017-05-13.
- ^ "No unrealistic aims: Shivani Kataria". http://www.deccanchronicle.com/. 2016-07-16. Retrieved 2017-05-13.
{{cite news}}: External link in|work= - ^ Nath, Joshua Arpit (July 30, 2016). "The Story Of Shivani Kataria - India's First Female Olympic Swimmer In 12 Years". The Times of India. Retrieved September 25, 2016.