Not winning travel bag as prize led Priyanka to take up race walking

Winning a travel bag was the start of her journey into race walking. As a sixth standard student, she was interested in sports and when her school suggested students to pick a sport, she dived and landed in gymnastics. It proved too tough for Priyanka who endured the tongue lashing from her gymnastics coaches.

Priyanka sought refuge and landed on the track, winning 800 m races in her school. But when it came to winning at the district level in Meerut, it was a difficult proposition. She just could not bag her travel bags as that was the prize for podium finishers.

Her coach too felt bad for her and suggested that she take part in race walking event as there were only two athletes. Priyanka finished third and the bag was finally hers. That travel bag became a metaphor for her to pursue a career in race walking where winning medals and explaining to folks what she did was proving to be difficult.

It has taken Priyanka years to bag an international medal. But she still finds it difficult to explain her sport. “We neither run nor walk, it involves lots of technique which needs to be learnt.

Training too is hard, but I sort of enjoy it. The degree of difficulty is huge as the moment we increase the pace, there is a danger of leaving contact with the ground,” Priyanka said during an event in Mumbai that saw Athletics Federation of India (AFI) announce its partnership with HSBC India to support women athletes of the country. Race walking is a sport where the athletes need to stay in constant contact with the ground and he/she does so by walking without bending the knees and rolling their hips.