Neha Chavan and Elavenil Valarivan: The Guru-Shishya bond that transcends beyond shooting
The coach has been Valarivan's mentor since day one of her shooting career
During the early years of her shooting career, in 2015, Elavenil Valaivan had a spat with her coach Neha Chavan. Being a fierce competitor, she did not like missing tournaments. However, due to her exams in school, she could not train well and Chavan advised her not to participate in a competition. Yet, the young shooter, being adamant, went ahead and tried her luck.
The result was a disaster.
"I think that was the turning point in my career. She was mad at me and she scolded me for two hours straight and I just cried throughout that period. After that, we discussed a lot and we got to know each other much better and since then we have been working flawlessly," reminisced Valarivan to Olympics.com before flying to Tokyo.
The 21-year-old herself admits that since she took to shooting she has spent more time with Chavan than with her parents. She would wake up at four in the morning, pick up Chavan and reach the range by five; this has been her routine for the past seven years. And Valarivan is not going to stop unless she has achieved her goal (read an Olympic medal).
"From day one, she has been focused on her goals. She loved the sport and she has enjoyed every moment of it. She knows exactly what she wants, and at a very young age of 14, she knew that she would do this for the rest of her life. She had this clarity of thought," revealed her coach.
With time, their bond has further deepened and flourished. Time and again in her career, whenever Valarivan has struggled in the range, her coach has had her back, as a friend and a guide.
"In 2017, after I played my first trials I just felt it is not happening and I called her up and cried a lot to her. We spoke for three hours and at the end of that call, I felt much better. The next day, in the finals I matched the world record of 252.3," the shooter revealed.
Both of them are guided by the same mantra, 'enjoy the sport'. In shooting, irrespective of the competition, the battle is always against oneself. The strife is to score more than what you did in your last session or competition. A process that is entirely focused on self-improvement with an unwavering goal to attain perfection each time a bullet is fired. And to help her in this journey there is a team in Gun for Glory, who are working round the clock, including Gagan Narang himself. And one of them is her sports psychologist Kritika Pandey with whom she has been having sessions since 2017.
"If you are mentally strong then you can push through any barrier. She (Kritika Pandey) has played a vital role in my career. In shooting, you are concentrating on just one target for hours and hours. If you do it for three-four days then you will not be able to even stand on the third day. But mental training gives me that edge," Valarivan said.
While Narang himself has always been just a call away. In fact, after a disappointing outing in New Delhi World Cup in March, she trained with the Olympic medallist in Hyderabad to get her mojo back. The result? She shot 630.4 in the European Championship to top the MQS (Minimum Qualification Score) section and was just 0.4 point short of the topper in the regular event, Ziva Dvorsak of Slovenia.
In Tokyo, if Valarivan finishes on the podium along with Divyansh Panwar in the Mixed Team event on Tuesday, along with her own, many a dream will also be fulfilled. The dream of a team that works behind the scenes, silently, yet relentlessly.