LEH: Often getting up after biting the dust is the most difficult thing in life, and Sohan Tarkar should be proud of himself for having pulled it off. The Maharashtra short-track ice skater had significant successes to speak of before depression pulled him down almost six years ago.
Tarkar started ice skating in 2010 and reached the 1500m semifinals of the Asian Winter Games in Sapporo, Japan, in 2017. He has also qualified multiple times for the Junior World Championships. Twice, he has qualified for the Senior World Cups (Germany and Italy being the venues), but, unfortunately, on both occasions, he couldn’t obtain the Schengen visa, according to a KIWG release.
Despondency and grief consumed him as a result. This was in the months before the COVID-19 outbreak. Then the pandemic made his situation worse. A lack of physical activity led to his gaining 20kg, which, mind you, could be very counter-productive in the sport.
From having a ripped physique, Tarkar turned into a totally out-of-shape, unrecognizable person. A lack of motivation to boot made him sort of depressed. Things were so bad that in his mind, he had made up the decision not ice skate ever again.
Tarkar’s mother, Sonali, came to his rescue and, after much effort, persuaded him to give it another shot. The motherly words worked and he decided to change his life at last towards the end of 2023. “I was really going down. I used to practice six hours every day to keep in shape. Pre-COVID, I weighed 58 kg and just like that, I got up to 78kg.”
