{"id":9830,"date":"2010-02-11T13:33:44","date_gmt":"2010-02-11T13:33:44","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/tat.reddaisytrading.co.uk\/index.php\/2010\/02\/11\/on-guard-fencing-champion-trains-for-the-2012-olympics\/"},"modified":"2016-01-07T16:46:32","modified_gmt":"2016-01-07T16:46:32","slug":"on-guard-fencing-champion-trains-for-the-2012-olympics","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.theasiantoday.com\/index.php\/2010\/02\/11\/on-guard-fencing-champion-trains-for-the-2012-olympics\/","title":{"rendered":"\u2018On Guard\u2019! Fencing champion trains for the 2012 Olympics"},"content":{"rendered":"<div id=\"content\">\n<h3>University of Leicester student Gaurav Gupta, 18, sets sights on the big prize<\/h3>\n<div><strong><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" hspace=\"10\" vspace=\"3\" align=\"right\" width=\"180\" height=\"295\" alt=\"\" src=\"http:\/\/theasiantoday.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2010\/02\/GauravGupta_180x232.jpg\"\/>UNIVERSITY of Leicester student Gaurav Gupta is setting his sights on the big prize \u2013 competing at the London 2010 Olympics.<\/strong> <\/div>\n<p>&#13;<\/p>\n<div>The 18-year-old is a champion fencer and has already achieved the number one spot in Indian fencing. <\/div>\n<p>&#13;<\/p>\n<div>But Gaurav, a first year economics student at the University, has plans to better that by becoming an Olympian in London 2012.<\/div>\n<p>&#13;<\/p>\n<div>Following a gruelling final in the Indian Men\u2019s Senior Foil Championships in Salem in Southern India, Gaurav is back in Leicester to continue with his studies.<\/div>\n<p>&#13;<\/p>\n<div>This January, he was the Runner-up in the Indian Championships, and in January 2009 he beat all the competition to become India\u2019s number one fencer. <\/div>\n<p>&#13;<\/p>\n<div>Gaurav\u2019s family are originally from Uttar Pradesh in Northern India, but Gaurav has lived in England all his life.\u00a0 <\/div>\n<p>&#13;<\/p>\n<div>He began fencing at 12 years old, when he joined an after school fencing club.\u00a0 Since then, Gaurav has excelled in a variety of competitions, reaching national and international levels. <\/div>\n<p>&#13;<\/p>\n<div>\u201cI am\u00a0happy about the success I\u2019m having in my fencing but think of this as a start and not the end,\u201d Gaurav said. <\/div>\n<p>&#13;<\/p>\n<div>\u201cI want to further my skills to one day be an Olympian and to put India on the map in the fencing arena.\u201d<\/div>\n<p>&#13;<\/p>\n<div>The talented teenager is an active member of the University of Leicester Fencing Club, and also travels to London each Wednesday to spend a day training with professional coaches.\u00a0 <\/div>\n<p>&#13;<\/p>\n<div>Juggling his academic studies with fencing can be difficult, but his love of the sport spurs him on to work hard at both.<\/div>\n<p>&#13;<\/p>\n<div>\u201cThe very qualities that will bring Gaurav an outstanding degree \u2013 hard work, dedication, tenacity and mental toughness &#8211; will bring him further success within world fencing,\u201d said Colin Hide, Director of Sport at the University of Leicester. <\/div>\n<p>&#13;<\/p>\n<div>\u201cSuccess breeds success and a successful fencer will most often be a successful student as each discipline informs the other about how to become a winner.\u00a0 I wish Gaurav every success for 2012.\u201d<\/div>\n<p>&#13;<\/p>\n<div>\u00a0<\/div>\n<p>&#13;\n<\/p><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>University of Leicester student Gaurav Gupta, 18, sets sights on the big prize UNIVERSITY of Leicester student Gaurav Gupta is setting his sights on the big prize \u2013 competing at the London 2010 Olympics. &#13; The 18-year-old is a champion fencer and has already achieved the number one spot in Indian fencing. &#13; But Gaurav, [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":11753,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[27],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-9830","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-sport"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.theasiantoday.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9830","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.theasiantoday.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.theasiantoday.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theasiantoday.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theasiantoday.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=9830"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.theasiantoday.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9830\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theasiantoday.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/11753"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.theasiantoday.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=9830"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theasiantoday.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=9830"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theasiantoday.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=9830"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}