Dynamic partnership: The Aadya-Sathish duo now trains in Kuala Lumpur and is World No. 32 in the World rankings.
| Photo Credit: RITU RAJ KONWAR
Ten years ago, Aadya Variyath was one of the bright young faces of Kerala badminton, raising hopes for the sport in singles in a State which was a doubles paradise.
Aadya, who hails from Kozhikode, promised that she would be different, that she would stick to singles but has now fallen to the doubles temptation. And she is doing very well too.
Representing Tamil Nadu, Aadya hit a new high, winning the National Games mixed doubles gold with Chennai’s K. Sathish Kumar here on Tuesday.
Like Sathish, Aadya focused on singles for more than a decade. And mixed doubles almost happened by accident.
“During matches at coach Ajit Wijetilekk’s Bengaluru academy, to make teams equal, we used to play mixed doubles. And in 2023, we participated in two, three international tournaments because we always travelled together,” Aadya told The Hindu.
“The coach advised us to play mixed doubles. He said it would help us get used to the court and we ended up winning three medals internationally without even practising seriously.
“And I think our coach Ajit saw potential and in 2023, he decided that we would have a shot at the Paris Olympics… we missed a few months because we were not able to play internationally and we were a few points away from qualifying.”
Shutting the door
Aadya has now shut the door on singles and is happy about the switch to mixed doubles.
“I won a singles bronze in the 2021 Ukraine Series but I realised that my body is more suited for mixed doubles because one of my strengths is my speed and I was getting injured a lot in singles,” explained the 23-year-old.
“My body was not able to take the load and I realised that there was only a certain level that I could reach (in singles) and that wasn’t enough for me so I decided to switch to mixed doubles.”
Aadya and Sathish now mostly train in Kuala Lumpur. And it has now carried the duo to No. 32 in the World rankings.
“Our Malaysian coach Jeevanathan Nair takes us to different academies for sparring so we get to play with a lot of different Malaysian players. We have trained with Goo Soon Huat & Lai Shevon Jemie (World No. 4), and Tan Kian Meng & Lai Pei Jing (World No. 17). We also got to play with Olympic silver medallists and Commonwealth Games gold medallists… it was a good experience sparring with them,” said Aadya.
She would hope that the new mixed doubles road will take her to LA 2028 and to many more happy days.
Published – February 05, 2025 07:53 pm IST
