Archery, academics, Asian Games gold: Prithika stays on target

Mumbai: A day before the Asian Games trials in May, archer Prithika Pradeep got her class 12th results—93%.

“I was happy, but I was more focused on the trials,” she said.

At the end of the three-day trials, Prithika also earned an Asian Games spot after finishing third in the highly competitive women’s compound section. Those few days were the most rewarding of the teen’s life then, yet hardly surprising for the budding archer and bright student.

“I knew I had worked hard for both,” Prithika said. “It was my goal for this year to play at the Asian Games.”

Not just played, she pocketed a gold too.

Prithika, who celebrated her 18th birthday five days ago in Aichi-Nagoya, won the women’s team compound Asian Games gold alongside teammates Jyothi Surekha Venna and Chikitha Taniparthi. Prithika was excellent in the final against China. She shot all 10s, like senior teammate Jyothi, showing composure beyond her age.

The Pune-based archer competed in the World Cup Stage 4 in Madrid, winning bronze. It was the only individual World Cup medal by an Indian woman in compound this year, underlining the potential of the 2024 Asian Youth champion, 2025 World Youth silver medallist, the and senior Asian Championships runner-up of last year.

Her coach Kunal Taware termed it a “big achievement” to even make the Asian Games squad, surpassing more experienced competitors in the trials. While she missed the bus in the January trials for the first two World Cup stages, Prithika was up and running in the May trials for the next two World Cups and the Asian Games after getting time for some technical work post her class 12th exams.

“Winning that individual World Cup medal will give her a lot of belief,” Taware said. “It was her dream to stand on the podium. I didn’t expect that she would get there so fast.”

Prithika began competing in international tournaments only in 2024, after she passed class 10 with 96% marks. Even before that, with only domestic events on the radar, finding the motivation to juggle archery and academics was never an issue. Even if that meant 14-hour days of attending school in the morning, classes in the afternoon and archery training in the evening.

“If I like something, I do it happily,” Prithika told HT before the Asian Games. “I love both archery and studies.”

The love for archery began in school in Pune, where the Nagercoil-born Prithika and her family have lived for the past 15 years after moving from Tamil Nadu. Asked to pick a hobby in school, Prithika hadn’t heard of archery until her mother, a teacher, told her it was a game of “bow and arrow”. She immediately got intrigued.

That intrigue developed into something more serious when she joined Taware’s academy at age 10. The coach got an early glimpse of the kid’s dedication.

“When she came to me, she was short and the body was a bit weak,” recalled Taware. “But she would come daily, and not miss a session without reason, even during exams or weekends. In the first 2-3 years, she didn’t win anything, but she never let it affect her, and kept coming daily.”

Her parents stayed put in Pune to let their daughter pursue archery, despite the family having no sporting background. Her father’s job in a private firm would require the family to move cities every few years. Her father, though, let opportunities go because Prithika was comfortable in the training setup in Pune with Taware.

“My parents have played a huge role,” said Prithika. “We could have moved back to Tamil Nadu. But they stayed here for me.”

And Prithika couldn’t stay without archery. Even a single day without training would make her feel “incomplete”. “Even on off days, I felt confused without being on the ground. If I got sick or had to stay at home, I didn’t know what to do.”

One such phase came in 2023, when Prithika didn’t compete for a few months. Noticing a pattern of feeling “weak” towards the end of competitions, Prithika realised she had to work on building strength. She added gym sessions to her routine, and decided to abandon her pickiness with food to eat a more protein rich diet, including non-vegetarian.

“She was only in class 8th, and started doing all this by herself,” said Taware. “She began working out for an hour at home, apart from all those hours of training and studying.”

All those hours of training and studying yielded a result of distinction in class 12th, and one of distinction on the field— a gold medal at the Asian Games at 18.