Where there is YouTube, there is a way. That is the moral of the Parth Salunkhe story.
On Sunday in Limerick, Ireland, 19-year-old Parth became the first Indian male archer to win a gold in the recurve category at the Youth World Championships.
India registered their best ever performance at the event, winning 11 medals.
Parth comes from a middle-class background in Satara, Maharashtra. His father Sushant was a national level silver medallist in kickboxing. His mother Anjali was a librarian.
In 2012, Parth’s archery coach suddenly left the job. For about a year, Parth’s growth as an archer suffered as he was without a trainer. That’s when his father took matters in his own hands.
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He first took lessons from Youtube, and then passed on the wisdom to his talented son over three years from 2014 to 2017.
Parth was later spotted by scouts during the Khelo India trials, and in 2018, moved to the Sports Authority of India (SAI) centre in Sonipat.
In Ireland, Parth edged out Korean seventh seed Song Injun in the Under-21 men's recurve individual final, winning 7-3 (26-26, 25-28, 28-26, 29-26, 28-26).
There was more good news for India when Bhaja Kaur beat Su Hsin-Yu of Chinese Taipei 7-1 (28-25, 27-27, 29-25, 30-26) for the women’s under-21 recurve bronze.
India left Ireland with six gold, one silver and four bronze medals. This was the highest in the standings in terms of total number of medals.
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But in the rankings India stood second behind Korea, who had six gold and four silver medals.
Salunkhe was down 1-3 after Injun sank two perfect 10s and three 9s from his first six arrows.
It appeared that the old Korean grip on India would assert itself again. But then Salunkhe snatched the third set by two points. He pierced one arrow closer to the centre (X) and made it three-all.
Then Salunkhe went for the kill, scoring two 10s and one 9 to take a 5-3 lead before finishing off with a flourish with two Xs.
