NEWS
When Dipa Karmarkar won a bronze medal at the 2014 Commonwealth Games in Glasgow she became the first Indian female gymnast in the history to do so. In 2016 Rio Olympics, the Agartala born became the first Indian female gymnast and the first Indian gymnast in 52 years to participate in the games.
Little did the 25-year-old knew that the entire country would hail her as the champion even after she finished 4th in Women’s Vault Gymnastics event in Rio, with an overall score of 15.066. Karmarkar landed the Produnova perfectly which is regarded as the most difficult vault currently performed in women’s gymnastics.
Dipa has been awarded the Padma Shri for her outstanding performance at Rio and the Rajiv Gandhi Khel Ratna award in August 2016.
Dipa lives her life in accordance with the clock. She wakes up at 7 AM and has her breakfast by 8. Then its time for her practice session. She trains from 8:30 AM till 12 noon. She has her lunch at 1 PM and takes rest until 3:30 PM.
This isn’t the end of her day. The next round of her training session begins at 4.30 PM which ends at 8:30 PM, after which she has her dinner and calls it a day.
Sunday is the only off day that she gets. “It’s the only day of the week I wake up at 9 in the morning. It’s a lazy day that is mostly spent on sleeping or watching movies online. For me, sleep is really important, as that’s the only way my body can recover,” the gymnast tells India Today.
When she is preparing for her competitions, it is usually intense training which also includes rehab sessions. Her fitness regime includes a lot of strength training, flexibility, agility, static and dynamic movements and certain exercises which are specific to gymnastics.
In cardio, She sprints for 70-80 metres. To ensure that the muscles remain flexible and strong she does certain hamstring exercises. Her post training exercises include a lot of stretching and muscle massages.
Dipa started to train in gymnastics since she was 6 years old under the coaching of Bisweshwar Nandi. She tells in an interview, “My biggest motivator is my coach who has not only been my biggest branch of support throughout my career but also stayed patient as coaching is very demanding and an athlete’s life is filled with ups and downs. India needs more coaches of his calibre and I am very fortunate to have had a mentor like Nandi sir during the entire duration of my career thus far. My biggest inspiration and my motivator is my coach, always helping me push my boundaries and helping me aim for more.”
Dipa’s diet is structured and balanced as one is needed for a gymnast. Proteins are an integral part of her diet. “My diet schedule includes more of chicken. For breakfast, I eat egg, Dalia, chana and a glass of milk. For lunch again, I have a couple of pieces of boiled chicken. For dinner, I only eat chicken and a bowl of vegetable soup. This is the diet I have been following not just after my qualification for the Rio Olympics but for years now,” said Dipa.
She has chicken pakodas on Saturdays and fried eggs on Sundays. That is the most she can treat herself with. She has given up on sweet carvings too.
In between her training sessions she replenishes the loss of electrolytes and energy by munching on dry fruits and sipping on juices and energy drinks.
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