To excel in sports, be a good human being first

Olympian Charles Borromeo never knew athletics would fetch stardom till he entered the portals of St. Xavier’s College in Ahmedabad.

He had been a footballer till then, excelling as a left forward. In fact, the performance of Charles in football at various competitions earned him a seat under sports quota.

Athletics coach at the college Subash Patel was quick to spot his agility and endurance. Then came the turning point in Charles’ sports career.

Two years of rigorous training saw him as a serious contender in 800 m at the all-India inter University athletics meet, and a winner of bronze medal in the same event at the 1979 open nationals.

Confidence swelled then on. “I started putting in a lot of hard work. Mr. Patel lent great support. He not only fine-turned my strengths, but also worked on eliminating my weaknesses. His role was very crucial in shaping me as a competitive athlete,” recalls the Arjuna awardee.

Borromeo’s moment of glory came in the 1982 New Delhi Asian Games, when he won 800 metres gold in record time.

“Being the Asian champion was an unbelievable feeling. Days like those are very special.”

Dream accomplished:

He also accomplished his dream of making it to the Olympics when he represented the country at the 1984 Los Angeles games. “That’s the dream of any athlete. I am one among the sportspersons in the country to achieve the Olympian tag,” says Borromeo, who won silver medal at the 1985 Asian Track &Field event and gold medal in the South Asian Federation (SAF) games the same year. He was conferred the Padma Shri, the country’s fourth highest civilian award, in 1984.

Hailing from a lower-middle class family in Devakottai in Sivaganga district, Borromeo studied at De Britto School, which has produced a good number of international athletes including Asian Gold medalist R.Gnana Sekaran.

“Football was the most popular sport in our town and a lot of tournaments used to take place. That was one of the major reasons for developing interest in the game. Also, one gets instant recognition among the local fans when he nets a lot of goals,” he smiles.

Soon after graduation, Borromeo joined Tata Steel at Jamshedpur. Working as a Sports Manager, he loves spending time interacting with the youngsters and sharing his experience with them.

But why didn’t he take up coaching after hanging up his boots? “I was interested in character building of sportspersons. At the Tata Academy, I urge the youngsters to be good human beings in the first place. Character matters more and I feel a sports person should be exceptional both on and off the field,” says Borromeo, who has been recently nominated by the Athletics Federation of India as a member of the monitoring committee for long, middle-distance and walking events for the 2010 Commonwealth Games.

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Solar eclipse won’t speak Games

A total eclipse of the sun a week before the Beijing Olympics will spook the superstitious but Chinese authorities have no reason to fear for the games, astrologers and feng shui experts say.

The phenomenon was once seen by China’s emperors as a portent of disaster, and astrologers predict some turbulence this time too, probably on the stock market and may be even on the streets.

However, any trouble will not be powerful enough, they say, to disrupt the world’s largest international sporting event or unduly worry China’s rulers.

Ms Mak Ling-ling, one of the most renowned feng shui and astrology experts in Hong Kong and author of many books, said the eclipse might bring small-scale political turbulence and problems to the transport and communication networks in Beijing during the Games.

“Protests and chaos on the street are very likely but they but they will not do any permanent harm to the Chinese authorities,” she told.

China may play down any association between the eclipse and the Olympics to avoid being mocked for being superstitious- but Ms Mak said it had a longtime practice of consulting feng shui experts when selecting athletes.

“The national teams give me the date and time of birth of the athletes and ask me to calculate and identify the ones with a strong will and a real chance of winning international games,” she said.

“No Olympics teams have consulted me about the eclipse but I believe if the authorities are really worried about it, they would seek help and do something discreetly without letting outsiders know.”

A total solar eclipse is caused when the moon blots out the sun by passing directly between it and the earth, and has traditionally been associated with misfortune.

The latest eclipse is set to traverse half the earth over the course of two hours in August 1. The path of the moon’s umbral shadow, some 10,200 kilometres (6,375 miles) long, will begin in Canada and extend across northern Greenland, the Arctic, central Russia and Mongolia, before ending in northern China. But it will not cross Beijing.

It will make its final stop at sunset in Xi’an, capital of China’s Shaanxi province and site of the famed terracotta army.

“In ancient times, Chinese people believed that a celestial dragonA or dog was devouring the sun during an eclipse,” said peter So, another top feng shui master in Hong Kong. “The belief gave rise to their practice of banging drums and pots to frighten away the animal,” she added.

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