KOOH Sports launches second edition of national talent hunt to identify fastest sprinters

PT Usha present at the launch of the first edition from earlier this year

Kooh Sports has launched the second edition of its nation-wide talent hunt to identify India’s fastest sprinters over 60m and 100m. Former sprint champion PT Usha is the brand ambassador for the event, which in its first edition drew a response from over 40,000 kids across India.

The winners of the talent hunt will get a chance to travel to Australia to train under world-renowned coach Sharon Hannan, who amongst others has coached 2012 Olympic 100m gold medalist Sally Pearson.

The second edition will see eight of the fastest boys and girls from across the country picked up and sent to train under Hannan. There are four categories set aside for the event – under-10, under-12, under-14 and under-16. So, a girl and a boy from each category will be chosen.

The contest will take place across 11 Indian cities – Delhi, Chandigarh, Jaipur, Lucknow, Jalandhar, Pune, Goa, Mumbai, Cochin, Hyderabad and Ahmedabad.

The winners from each city will be called for the finale to be held on February 9th, 2014 in Mumbai. The final winners of Speedstar season 2 will get a chance to train in Australia with Sharon Hannan. Griffith University will host the winners and also conduct master classes for them.

Prabhu Srinivasan, CEO, KOOH Sports said: “Speedstar was conceptualized in 2012 with an intent to motivate kids and encourage schools to partake in athletics. The ‘Speedstar’ initiative is a movement to generate interest and awareness for the most natural form of sport – Running. With the hunt we would like to bring the concept of “athlete first, sportsman later” in the mainstream sports training. The first season witnessed an overwhelming response and we came across kids with huge potential. This year we will be considering adopting talent for further education/training in athletics.”

Brand ambassador PT Usha was happy to once again be associated with the sport: “I have been associated with the initiative “Speedstar” for two years now. It’s great to see that an organisation like KOOH Sports has come forward to promote athletics. We witnessed a phenomenal talent pool at the first season of Speedstar, with proper training and guidance these kids can do very well in the field of athletics.”

Air Marshal Denzil Keelor, Chairman, Special Olympics Bharat: “We are very excited to be a part of Speedstar. Our association with KOOH Sports is forged to support each other for unified development of sports at the grass root levels in India. Our movement at SOB uses sports as a catalyst to transform the lives of children with intellectual disability. Through initiatives like Speedstar our children will get a great platform to showcase their talent.”

The first edition of the event saw a massive response of over 10,000 participants in early 2013. 6 winners from across India were chosen to get trained in Australia under Hannan.