Joshana Chinappa the 2nd seed of the tournament won the Ladies German Open in Saarbrucken yesterday. She beat the 8th seed Gaby Schmol from Switzerland in the final. Joshana who hadn’t dropped a single set all tournament continued her form to beat Schmol 11-6, 11-7, 11-6. She will now head to Leeds for some training under Malcolm Willstrop. This is joshana’s 2nd WISPA title and should give her a big confidence boost going into the summer season. 
Vikas continued his form at the world championships and was the only indian to win gold. He has been working towards this and it was a major step forward for the young lad who has been training for the last few months under the tutelage of MCT coach E Chiranjeevi.
This is a big step and now it is time to focus on the Youth Olympics and then get the boy ready for the junior realms of the sport. Progression is something that Indian talent has lacked over the last few years and so we need to really focus on his needs and get them stronger, fitter and more mentally tough.
Vikas Krishan kept the Indian flag flying high by making it to the final of the world championships in Baku, Azerbaijan. Him and Shiva Thapa were the only two indians to get this far, and hence qualifying for the Youth Olympics later on this year in Singapore. Vikas has been in stellar form at Baku, and has not conceeded a single point in his last two bouts. He now faces Evaldas Petrauskas from Lithuania in the final.
Vikas has been one of the juniors MCT has been supporting and has been training under Coach E. Chiranjeevi and Coach Manoharan and there has been considerable improvements in his fundamentals.
Dipika Pallikal has achieved all there is to achieve in the junior realms of squash, however Sunday she finally made a splash in the professional circuit by winning the $8,000 WISPA Indian Challenger. She had a great tournament dismissing Sharon Wee the top seed in the semis and then beating Emma Beddoes 11-9, 11-8, 9-11, 11-6 in the final.
This win will move her ranking up to around 43 in the world. Dipika has been training hard in Egypt and has just returned from a stint in Leeds. She is getting into form at the right time and will be one of the people to watch at the Commonwealth Games in October.
As the Yellow Pages Series in South Africa progresses Sarabani Nanda is getting better and better. She is running against some of the best runners in South Africa and she has really risen to the occasion. She ran her personal for the second time in two weeks last night. She ran the 100m in 11.94 seconds which is 0.04 off her personal best and came second in the race. This was followed by the 200m where she ran a 24.58 seconds which improved on her old personal best which was 24.63 seconds.
Sarabani is proving how a structured training program and a correct environment can really bring the best out of an athlete. She still has two more races in the Yellow Pages series on the 30th in Cape town and another on the 6th of April in Johannesburg, so we are expecting even better times
Three of the MCT wrestlers left last night for a training stint at the US Olympic Center in Colorado Springs. Yogeshwar Dutt, Ramesh Kumar and Mausam Khatri all headed west to be able to train and spar with the national team of the United States. They will be training there until the 10th of April and will then return for the trials for the Asian Championships in New Delhi.
Dinesh won gold after back to back walk overs at the concluded Commonwealth Championships in New Delhi. He was due up against Callum Johnson (SCO) who had to withdraw due to an arm injury sustained in his last bout. Dinesh will now get ready for his next tournament which is the Brandenburg Cup in Germany in June 2010.
The test event f
or the Commonwealth Archery concluded over the weekend and it was a decent showing by the unusual suspects. Kapil won silver losing out to tarundeep Rai in the finals. Kapil has been on a steady climb and was part of the Indian team in some of the World Cups last year.
In the womens section Chekrovolu Swuro (Anga) also lost in the final to Dipika Kumari while Sushma won bronze. The archers now go back into training and get ready for the upcoming world cups starting later on this month.
Sarabani Nanda ran her personal best last weekend in the Yellow Pages Athletic Series in Potchefstroom, South Africa. She ran her personal best ever time in the 200m at 24.63 sec. and was placed 2nd. She also ran the 100m and was placed overall 5th with a time of 12.04 sec.
This is her 3rd meet of the series and she has been steadily improving her times. Sajeesh Joseph the other athlete competing started the 1500m but had to withdraw with a strained calf.
Both athletes are slated to compete in the next Yellow Pages meet on March 24th 2010. Looking forward to some better times.
