Manav Mehta is the youngest member of an expedition that hopes to create an open water relay swim record during a gruelling tribute swim to 26/11 victims and martyrs
“It’s the waves that I like when I’m in the sea. They cuddle you and have fun with you. You have to go with the flow... that’s when I get my rhythym.”
It’s clear that 16-year-old Manav Mehta has a passion for the sea. He learnt how to swim as a five year old under coach Kishore Patil at Panvel’s Karnala Sports Academy. Within a couple of years, he plunged into sea swimming, and has since embarked on several long-distance channel, river and sea expeditions, including a record-setting, 433-km Goa-Mumbai open water relay swim in 2015. Before you allow Mehta’s exploits and his benign description of genteel ripples into leading you to believe that long distance sea swimming is easy-breeze, factor this: swimmers are constantly subjected to cuts and brusies while in water, jellyfish stings are a nasty reality, waves during rough weather feel like whiplash, sunburns and blisters are not only common but extremely severe and swimmers end up barfing for prolonged periods while in water!
All this and more is what the teenaged Mehta has signed up for, for the next fortnight. The 11th grader at Podar International School is the youngest member of the six-member Sea Hawks team, which will dive into the harbour at the Gateway of India on Saturday, 26 November for a 1,000-km swim in the Arabian Sea to Mangaluru. The 26/11 Tribute Swim, supported by IDBI Bank, is being led by Wing Commander Paramvir Singh. The 41-year-old, who had led the record-setting Goa-Mumbai expedition as well as the 2,800-km Ganga swim feels the endeavour would be a fitting tribute to the victims and martyrs of the 2008 attacks, the perpretrators of which entered the city from the sea before their killing spree resulted in 164 deaths.
“The motivation comes from the cause,” says Wing Commander Singh. “This year marks the eight year since the attacks that shook up not only India, but also other nations such as Israel, Canada, France and Britain, we want to condemn terrorism.”
Incidentally, if and when the Sea Hawks team makes it to Mangaluru on December 10, they will set a new record for the longest open water relay swim ever by an unlimited number of swimmers. “This attempt to set a new world record is a tribute to all those martyrs, who lost their lives guarding ours, and to those heroes who showed bravery in face of danger. IDBI Bank is proud to be a part of this noble cause,” says KP Nair, deputy managing director, IDBI Bank.
For Mehta, the expedition will be “like a long picnic”. Although “picnic” isn’t the word that comes to mind when he describes his dialy routine for the last couple of months: an 8-10km run every morning, strength training, which includes crossfit, cardio and cycling, and swimming for 3-4 hours. Perhaps it is this rigour and discipline that explains why he has no apprehensions and is happy to “sacrifice: social media. “I will be active in something far more important,” he says, fairly demonstrating the all-for-one value and one-for-all team spirit that Wing Commander Singh has inculcated in the Sea Hawks. “The team is my family. I learn more here than I do in school or at home,” says Mehta. “I’ve learnt that one should never give up in life. It doesn’t matter where you are and what you are doing, you don’t raise your hand.”
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