UAE star athlete dreams of running in Olympics

A multi-talented Indian school girl is running for glory by scorching the athletic tracks in UAE driven by her burning desire to reach the Olympic summit.

Tanishqa Kambli's Olympic goal may be a distant dream but her achievements thus far makes one believe it could become a reality.

A precociously talented individual, 15 year-old Tanishqa seems to be possessed with a God-given gift to turn anything she touches into gold.

Since the age of seven, Tanishqa has been actively engaged in competitive sports beginning with tennis, her first love.

Her infatuation with sports saw her playing cricket, football, badminton, swimming and table tennis.

However, The Millennium School, Dubai student seems to be cut out for athletics as she pursues her Olympic dream with steely determination.

“In school competitions, I have won gold medals. My ultimate goal is to reach Olympics,” said Tanishqa, who hails from a sporting family from Mumbai.

Her mother Preeti represented Mumbai women’s cricket team and her father Hemant played for the Oman cricket team.

Tanishqa's brother Arnav, 11, is one of the UAE’s most promising cricketers.

Being a natural athlete, Tanishqa made a sensational start to her athletics career in 2013 by bagging 20 gold medals in different competitions in the UAE.

“I started from school and I went for many competitions. In the first year, I got about 20 gold medals in Abu Dhabi competitions in 100, 200, 400, long jump, relays and hurdles,” she said with her pet event being the 400 and long jump in which she represented UAE at the CBSE Nationals in Varanasi in 2013.

However, Tanishqa was hit by injuries last year, suffering a neck injury caused by trampoline jumping and spraining her leg during a long jump event.

But the medals kept coming despite these minor setbacks filling her trophy cupboard with more than 40 medals in total.

Her focus is now only on athletics as she targets the CBSE National Athletic Championships to be held in Raipur, India next month.

 “I have no time for other sports because I’m fully focussing on athletics six days a week. I come for training almost 20 hours a week. My goal is to win gold at the (CBSE) Nationals,” said Tanishqa who tasted early success as a tennis player winning the Sharjah Ladies Club Under-18 tennis title and the Coral Beach Under-12 championship twice.

 “I also played cricket but do not have time now. I played tennis for six years and left tennis for athletics. I played table tennis in inter school competitions, also played badminton, got medals in swimming, and also played football for school,” said Tanishqa, her eyes glistening while rattling off her achievements.

“They want her everywhere. Any sport you put her, she can perform well. That is her ability, I told her to focus on athletics. She has no time for other sports,” said her proud mother Preeti.

Sports has not affected her studies being a good orator and winning the best student award thrice when she was at Ryan Star International school. She emerged as best in elocution, histrionics in drama, inter-school science and creative writing competitions.

“I really want to go for Olympics,” said the starry-eyed Tanishqa who idolises London 2012 400 metres gold medallist Sanya Richards.