Hyderabad's ultimate champion

Samarth Mishra used to be a die-hard football fan and would play no other sport, until one Sunday, his sister forced him into accompanying her to a game of ultimate. Since then on, the football was replaced by a flying disk, and the man who “didn’t give two hoots about the sport” five years ago, has now represented India in the World Ultimate and Guts Championships in London that took place in June this year.

The 25-year-old, who hails from Delhi, is a student of ISB, Hyderabad and gives all credit for where he has reached to the B-school. His trip to London was heavily crowdfunded by the students and the faculty of the school. “I wrote an email asking for some funds and the whole B-school pitched in. It soon became a campaign for support. Every student was wearing the colours of the Indian flag, and that really gave a push to the fund raising campaign. The support really wasn’t for me, the support was for team India,” he says.

Talking about the transition from football to ultimate, he says that it wasn’t too difficult. “Ultimate is played on a field of the same dimensions as a football field; we use the same kind of shoes, and there is only a little more sprinting around,” he explains, adding, “The one thing that differentiates ultimate from other sports is that there is no referee. It is self adjudicated at every level. This was the reason I left football. In football, there is scope for cheating, while here, you cannot cheat because there is no referee,” he says.

This idea also translates onto the community and culture that the sport nurtures. With just over 2,000 players in the country, the small knit community is very welcoming. “I don’t play the sport just for the sport itself. I love the game, of course, but there is so much more to it. People who are curious tend to fall in love with this sport because they find a lot of like-minded people in it. Nobody just leaves a sport that they are comfortable with to take on something new. And those who do, you find them here,” he says.

Samarth has played over 30 tournaments so far, within the country and abroad. He says that even though the sport is little known, it has potential to be commercially viable because it is a fast paced, interesting sport to watch. “I will continue to play as long as my legs work,” he says, talking about his future plans. Samarth practices with his friends every week and is eagerly looking forward to Gyontak, a tournament which will take place in Mumbai towards the end of this year.