Brushing aside the “huge disappointment” of roller-skating being excluded from the on-going Incheon Asian Games, Hyderabad’s Anup Kumar Yama has re-asserted his class in the Asian Championship in China on Thursday with two gold and three silver.

Anup won a gold each in figure skating, combines (figure and artistic), a silver each in inline free-style, artistic skating and pair dance (with Praneeta). He also won bronze medals in the men’s free-style and pair skating events in the 2010 Guangzhou Asiad.

The 28-year-old, a 2013 World Champion in the inline skating category, is widely perceived to be the face of Indian skating at the Asian and the World levels by the sheer weight of his performances – eight gold, five silver and nine bronze in the Asian level competitions besides a bronze in the 2012 World championship and the gold in the 2013 edition.

“Missing Incheon Asiad is a huge blow. So, the onus was on me to prove what I can achieve. Glad that I could prove it again,” says Anup. He has now set sight on the world championship in Spain where he will be defending his title.

source: http://www.thehindu.com / The Hindu / Home> News> Cities> Hyderabad / by V.V. Subrahmanyam / Hyderabad – September 26th, 2014