Bengaluru (Karnataka) [India], October 11 (ANI): In a first-of-its-kind initiative, the two-time Olympic Bronze medal-winning Indian Men’s Hockey Team participated in a novel chess grasp class performed by former International Chess participant and co-owner of American Gambits Prachura P Padakannaya on the Sports Authority of India (SAI) campus in Bengaluru on Friday. The session was designed to assist gamers suppose extra clearly and make sharper selections by drawing correlations from chess to hockey, as per a launch from American Gambits.
Prachura highlighted how rules resembling planning, anticipation, positioning and endurance may be utilized successfully on the hockey discipline. Using video examples from precise recreation conditions, he demonstrated the significance of foresight, calculated threat and psychological self-discipline in a aggressive sport. As a part of the session, Prachura broke down the three key phases of chess: opening, middle-game and the endgame. He defined how the opening is about making the suitable strikes at first to construct a robust basis, just like hockey getting off to a great begin.
The middlegame, the place the largest battles are fought, attracts parallels with the significance of controlling the midfield in hockey to forge success of their assault. Finally, the endgame, the place precision and mentality determine the end result of the end result, was likened to a striker ending off a transfer in hockey.
Here, Prachura confirmed the highlights from India’s Tokyo Olympics Bronze-medal outing– calling it the proper endgame — the place the Indian workforce held their nerves to defend 5-4 in opposition to Germany regardless of their opponents getting a penalty nook within the final six seconds of the sport. He additional defined the roles of every chess piece and associated them to hockey positions: pawns performing as the primary line of defence, rooks and bishops creating construction and motion, knights stunning opponents with sudden strikes, whereas the queen embodies versatility and dominance. Reflecting on his interplay with the workforce, Prachura mentioned, ‘The development in each video games could be very, very comparable. My expertise right here was incredible as a result of I by no means anticipated them to be so curious and fascinating for a chess session. They had been very inquisitive in regards to the completely different codecs in chess, how one must suppose seven-eight strikes forward and so they had been additionally fairly amused to see how calm Gukesh’s heartrate was after I performed the video of his current match in opposition to Hikaru.’ ‘Even earlier than the session started, they had been interacting with me and had been speaking about what they do off the sector and of their free time. It was good to know at the least half the workforce has performed chess both with their household or teammates. It was a fantastic expertise to have and at all times a pleasure to work together with one of the best sportsmen of the nation,’ he added. Adding to the enjoyable and fascinating session, Prachura additionally invited the gamers for a pleasant recreation of chess and Indian midfielder Vivek Sagar Prasad was the primary to elevate his hand up for the problem. He was partnered by Captain Harmanpreet Singh, who performs chess together with his spouse when he’s again dwelling on a break. The remainder of the workforce cheered the duo on. Sharing his ideas, Vivek mentioned, ‘It was a really insightful chess masterclass, and we’re grateful that Prachura made it so attention-grabbing by drawing similarities between the 2 sports activities. It was a studying expertise, often in hockey we have now to suppose two to a few strikes forward, however in chess they’re considering seven to eight strikes forward, and that is one thing I want to work on personally in my recreation.’ Relating chess to his function in hockey, he mentioned, ‘Like on the chessboard, I see myself as each the knight and the queen. The knight’s unpredictability and the queen’s freedom to maneuver wherever replicate my function as a midfielder. Just like them, I cowl the sector from assault to defence, stepping in wherever the workforce wants me.’ Adding to Vivek’s views, Harmanpreet mentioned, ‘As elite athletes, we at all times have one thing new to be taught from one other sport. We be taught many new sides of chess at present, and positively extra such participating periods will solely assist us have a holistic strategy to our recreation and suppose in a different way.’ Indian males’s hockey chief coach Craig Fulton praised the initiative, stating, ‘Every recreation has a technique and chess is likely one of the finest methods to discover ways to suppose a number of steps forward. In hockey too, should you begin with the unsuitable setup, you open your self as much as errors, it is about getting the inspiration proper, adapting within the center and ending sturdy. That connection between chess and hockey was clear at present. It was additionally encouraging to see how engaged the gamers had been, and I imagine periods like this is not going to solely sharpen their decision-making but in addition maintain them positively occupied of their free time. Who is aware of, perhaps we’ll even have an intra-squad chess match sooner or later.’ (ANI)