Anshul Kothari

Early life

At the age of four, Kothari was diagnosed with chronic flat foot condition. The doctors advised his parents for surgery but his parents took a non-conventional route and put him into sports and physical activities. Kothari started out with Gymnastics and in 1999, went for a summer camp of swimming. He soon developed love towards water and thus his journey in swimming began.

Swimming career

Kothari is one of the accomplished swimmers in India having represented India at Commonwealth Games 2010, Asian Games 2010 and Asian Games 2014.

In 2010, he became the first swimmer from Gujarat to have represented at the Commonwealth Games and Asian Games. He has taken part in 29 National Championships where he represents his home state Gujarat.

19th Commonwealth Games 2010

Kothari represented India at the Commonwealth Games held at New Delhi. He swam in 50,100 m freestyle and also 4 × 100 m freestyle events. He swam the third leg in the 4 × 100 m freestyle relay which made history by qualifying for the finals for the first time in the history. The Indian 4 × 100 m freestyle relay quartet stood 6th in the finals.

16th Asian Games 2010

Kothari represented India at the Asian Games held in Guangzhou, China. He swam in the 50 m butterfly and 4 × 100 m freestyle relay events.

17th Asian Games 2014

He swam in 50 m freestyle, 50 m butterfly and also the 4 × 100 m freestyle relay events. He finished at 14th position in 50 m Butterfly and 20th position in 50 m Freestyle. In the 4x100 freestyle relay, Kothari swam the lead off leg and the team finished at 6th position in the finals.

Asian Age Group Championships

Kothari was part of the gold medal winning teams in 4 × 100 m Freestyle Relay at Asian Age group Championships in both 2011 and 2015 editions.

34th National Games 2011

At the 34th National Games 2011 held at Ranchi, Jharkhand. He was the only swimmer from Gujarat to win medals. His tally of individual medals (2 medals) was the highest among any sport in overall medal tally (6 medals) for Gujarat.

35th National Games 2015

He won 3 medals at the national games held at Trivandrum Kerala which helped Gujarat to stand at 9th position in overall medal tally.

National Championships 2011

Kothari has been a consistent swimmer for his state Gujarat at the nationals and in the year 2011, he ended a two decade gold drought for his state Gujarat by finishing at 1st position in the 50 m freestyle event.

12th South Asian Games 2016

Asnhul won a gold medal in 4 × 100 m medley relay, silver medal in 50 m freestyle, and silver medal in 4 × 100 m freestyle relay.

Open water Competitions

During the early stages of his career Kothari swam few open water competitions. In the year 2005, he swam at the 62nd World’s longest swimming competition (82 km) and finished at 2nd position by completing the race in 10 hours 28mins.

70th Senior National Aquatics Championships 2016

Kothari, along with the Gujarat swimming team won the gold medal and set a national record in 4 x 50m Mixed Medley Relay event with the timing of 01:53.42.

Kothari also won a gold medal in 50m Butterfly with the timing of 00:24.93, silver medal in 100m Freestyle with the timing of 00:51.94, silver medal in 50m Freestyle with the timing of 00:23.31, and bronze medal in 4x50m mixed freestyle relay event.

Personal life

Kothari completed his graduation in Computer Engineering (B.Tech) from Sardar Vallabhbhai National Institute of Technology, Surat (NIT-Surat) in 2012. During his years at SVNIT, Kothari continued his sport simultaneously making several appearances on the Indian Team.

Awards