Gold medal-winning hurdler Aliza is hard on herself

Aliza Mulla with the gold she won in 100m hurdles at the Khelo India Youth Games in Chennai. PIC/Aliza`s personal collection

Thane girl Aliza Mulla, 17, is unhappy with her timing despite winning gold for Maharashtra in the 100m hurdles at the 6th Khelo India Youth Games (KIYG) at Chennai earlier this week. The teen athlete said that winning a medal at the KIYG was her dream, but she needs to improve on her timing for sure. In the 100m hurdles final, Maharashtra's Aliza took 14.40s for the gold ahead of Kerala's Antreesa M (14.48s) and Telangana's Aerrolla PR (14.59). Mulla, a class 12 student of the VG Vaze Kelkar College of Arts, Science and Commerce (Mulund), explained that she expected better timing considering the participants were the same as they were at the Junior Nationals held at Coimbatore, Tamil Nadu (November 6-10) and the School Games Federation of India (SGFI), held at Chandrapur in Maharashtra, in December (26-30).

"Winning a gold at the Khelo India Games was surely my dream and I should have been happy with the gold. But I am not satisfied with my performance as I feel my timing was not satisfactory. I could have done way better considering I had trained for it," Aliza, who won a gold at SGFI with personal best timing of 14.17s and silver (14.40s) in the Jr Nationals in 100m hurdles, told www.mid-day.com.

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Talking about her journey in athletics, Aliza said what started as a time pass activity in Class II has become a passion for her. "It was in Holy Cross School in Thane where I started learning athletics from my first coach Sandhya Mandrekar. Over a period of time when I started to do well at events, I got hooked to it," remarked Aliza, who thanked her dad Aftab and mother Dr Iffat Hamduley for encouraging her to pursue a career in sports.

Meanwhile, Aliza said she started training under her current coach Shrinivas Gupta at the Fr Agnel Ground, Vashi, two years ago as she wanted to improve her speed. "While Sandhya mam taught me the nuances of the sport, it was Shrinivas sir who helped me improve my speed. I have been training under him for the past two years. My ultimate goal is to do well at international meets like Nigerian world champion Tobi Amusan," she signed off.