Rohan Chowdhury in Paris
Sukant Kadam, India’s para-badminton star, who missed out on Tokyo 2020, is set to take on the court in Paris 2024, with a more mature outlook to the game.
Kadam, hailing from Pune, Maharashtra, is a mechanical engineer. He started badminton under Nikhil Kanetkar and Mayank Gole in 2015, and since then won multiple international medals, including a bronze in the team event in Jakarta Asian Para Games and two in Hangzhou 2022, one in singles and one in doubles with Pramod Bhagat.
In this exclusive conversation with RevSportz, Kadam opened up on his preparations for Paris 2024, his mental strength mantra, the mentality change of players towards Paralympics, Pramod Bhagat’s unfortunate miss-out from Paris 2024 and much more. Here are some of the excerpts from the entire conversation.
Q: Medals in Asian Games, World Championships, and now the ultimate test. How are the preparations going and how is the Paralympics different?
Kadam: Hangzhou was the first step, then we had the World Championships; it was all for this tournament. Paralympics is the ultimate test; everyone dreams of it. The qualification phase was tough — both physically and mentally; the SL4 category especially. Hangzhou was a good test because badminton in Asia is itself of a very high level.
The name tag ‘Paralympics’ itself builds a lot of pressure and expectations, and that is what makes it so much special. In Tokyo, I was on the other side. So happy to be able to break the barrier this time. This is a tournament that comes in four years — it takes a lot of time to come but it goes in a jiffy.
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🚨 #SukantKadam Exclusive 🚨
“Medal count is Ok, but the number of Golds is what matters” – @sukant9993 ahead of #ParisParalympics2024.
India’s SL4 Badminton star, opens up on #PramodBhagat‘s disqualification, changes in mentality among the players, mental strength and much… pic.twitter.com/Nu9CJFbLiA
— RevSportz Global (@RevSportzGlobal) August 19, 2024
Q: How much is it mental in the elite level of the game? What is your mantra?
Kadam: I think mentality is what differentiates all the athletes. At the elite level, physically all are fit. It is the mentality that makes the difference. Talking about me, I take one day at a time and try to learn new things to improve myself. I give 60-70 per cent of my daily training towards mental strength. After playing the sport for several years, now at the elite level, mental fitness is what will make the difference — someone who is mentally fitter on the day will win it.
I take psychology sessions, and review it every week — what are the areas of comfort and discomfort. It’s a long process. One special thing that I do — doing cross sport training. I take a lot of inspiration from the shooters. I think they are the toughest mentally, to maintain focus and perform at the highest stage.
I have spoken to Rahi Sarnobat (Commonwealth and Asian Games Gold Medalist in 25 m pistol) on how to improve focus and be mentally more strong. We both are from Maharashtra and have the same strength and conditioning coach. It helped me a lot.
Q: You played with Pramod Bhagat for a long time. How do you see his disqualification from the Paralympics? How big of a blow is it for India?
Kadam: It’s a huge blow! A sure shot on the gold medal is gone. He is a leader and is like my mentor. I felt so bad on hearing the news. First, Vinesh’s incident and now Pramod bhaiya — both heartbreaks. But I think we need to take lessons from this and educate athletes more on the whereabouts of doping so that such incidents are not repeated in the future. Talking about Vinesh, it was a matter of 100 gms — even the medal is heavier than that. Going into the Paralympics, I’m just taking lessons from these unfortunate events, that sport is harsh.
Q: As we are aiming for a 30 plus medal count for the Paralympics; do you think it’s feasible?
Kadam: See, I’ll talk about the mentality of the current contingent. At the beginning, there was the generation who thought of qualifying for the Paralympics, then came the generation who aimed for a podium finish. The current generation is after gold medals. It is the gold medals which will decide the ranking, and we are aiming for a top 10 to top 15 finish. This mentality shift has happened over time, thanks to all those who came ahead of us and showed us the way. The current India goes for gold. I think 30 plus is surely feasible! But as I said, the medal count is alright, but the number of golds is what we are going for.
Also Read: Paris: Where dreams lock in love and triumphs unlock destiny