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It is all about food and fitness

Belly rules the mind is what Azharuddin believes. He tells how and why

HUNGRY KYA? Azharuddin is a frugal eater. He proves it at The Pavillion PHOTOS: ANU PUSHKARNA

AT 43, Mohammed Azharuddin can give youngsters a great complex. Endowed with an enviably good height, he has a perfect physique for a sportsperson, refined by gym exercises. His choice of tasteful wear, and a face without creases, further vouches for his ever-young spirit. "I have always been fond of good clothes," he quips. Though his eyes give away his inherent shy nature, the former captain of the Indian cricket team manages a good tête-à-tête. Dressed in colourful red and yellow tee and trousers and matching sunglasses, Azhar is ready for a "light lunch" at the ITC hotel Maurya Sheraton and Tower's lobby level restaurant The Pavilion. It has been recently refurbished. Its interiors are now donned with glass, wood and silver and the leather chairs in dark wood tones make a perfect match. As one compliments him on his perfect physique, he shyly reacts, "Oh, that's because I take two things very seriously in life, fitness and food. When I was quite young, I would eat everything, from junk food to oily and spicy ones and that too, in good quantity. Later, I realised that I was wrong. If one thinks that if he takes good, heavy lunch, he will have a perfect health, he is wrong. You must know what your body wants. Nobody will gain or lose weight if his/her food and exercise routines are organised. Being a sportsperson, for example, we do require carbohydrate, but we can't have excess of it." And Azhar always preferred a light lunch, the evidence of which is soon provided. "Please bring me egg white omelette, salad, yellow dal and phulkas," he quickly orders without even glancing through the newly introduced menu.

As he lays his hands on salad, Azhar reveals the secret of his being the fittest man in the team during his captainship.

High standards

"I had set very high standards for myself especially in fitness. I always wanted to compete with the younger boys in the team. I would see to it that I was able to run as much, and as fast as they did. For that I cut down on my oily food, stopped eating red meat. But I continued taking chicken for its protein value." And as always Azhar kept believing Steve Elbert who said that `fast food is equivalent to pornography, nutritionally speaking'. And Azhar is quick add, "However regular you may be with your exercises, if you eat junk food, you have wasted your exercises".

Azhar has learnt this lesson of fitness as much from his own experience as from a brother-like friend and trainer Faiyaaz Ali Khan who trains at Azhar's own gym at Hyderabad. He trains Azhar too. "I owe a lot to him. He was my greatest strength during by dark period. I can vouch that there is no greater trainer than him that I can see around me."

And a healthy body, he agrees, gives you a cheerful temperament. A temperament that helped him smoothly sail through as the captain and also face the world stoically during his dark days. He adds, "I never had any ego hassles when I was a captain. I wouldn't mind picking up the shoes of my team mates, bringing water for them, etc." During his tenure as captain, there were three former captains in the team, Kapil Dev, Ravi Shastri and Dilip Vengsarkar. But no one heard of any conflict between him and them. Wonder how this shy guy might have handled them? Azhar divulges, "I would always look up to them and give them due respect. I used to think that whenever I would be in need of an advice, I had three captains to fall back on."

Now seen as a cricket expert on India TV and also a columnist, this dashing cricketer - an admirer of Adam Gilchrist, Brian Lara and Laxman - who had to be "endlessly patient" for his dark days to be over, just can't be patient with `paye' anymore. It gave him tough time, recalls Azhar who is "allergic to sea food".

"Once I was forced to eat `paye' in dinner at a friend's farm house as it was a wedding occasion. It fell so heavy on my stomach that I slept after having it. I couldn't get up to go home.

Next morning too, I could barely open my eyes for a few minutes and then again was back on bed. Ab main `paye' nahi khata... " he concludes, laughing.

RANA SIDDIQUI

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