Meet Abeer Arsiwala, Pro Kabaddi League’s only woman trainer

Joining the U Mumba kabaddi franchise setup as a strength and conditioning coach a couple of years ago, Abeer Arsiwala stared at an invisible wall. On the other side of it stood the players, unsure about what a woman—especially one that doesn’t look anything like a kabaddi player—could bring to the table.

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“For the kabaddi players who have never worked with a woman, specifically a woman trainer, it was like a culture shock,” Arsiwala says. “They come with a mindset, right? That I don’t want gyaan, especially from a young woman who is so tiny.

“But because U Mumba has a lot of young players, it was easy to change their mindsets. And the moment the players see the difference on the mat, they start to realise. Then the whole wall comes down.”   

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In a sport and league flocked with sturdy men battling to outmanoeuvre each other on the mat with speed, stamina and strength, Arsiwala, 24, is the only female among the training staff of all teams in the eighth season of the Pro Kabaddi League (PKL). Arsiwala and her partner Manuel D'souza signed up as the strength and conditioning trainers of U Mumba in 2019, but this is the first time that the duo will be a part of the season as the league resumes after a two-year hiatus due to the pandemic.

And as she looks around within the bio-bubble in Bengaluru where all the teams are stationed, Arsiwala has bittersweet feelings about being in the extreme minority. “Of course, I feel really grateful that I’m here, I get to do what I love and that I’m associated with a team that has a management and players who reciprocate the respect. I’m happy that I’m the first and it’s a start, but I also feel sad that it’s never done before. This is season 8 and it’s the first time a lady is coming in in strength and conditioning,” she says.  

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The respect she mentions is crucial for Arsiwala. In July last year, during one of her live fitness sessions on Instagram as part of a series of activities by U Mumba in the lockdown for its social media followers, Arsiwala became the target of obscene comments from a follower. U Mumba duly reported the “heinous act of cyber sexual assault" to the concerned authorities.

“That makes it easier, and you feel that this is the kind of team I want to work with,” Arsiwala says. “Not a lot of people step up, because how hard is it to find one unknown account in a billion faces. But the biggest thing is they tried, they cared.” 

Football player to kabaddi trainer 

Arsiwala has grown up being around—and playing—with boys. Having two elder brothers who played football in their society in Mumbai, Arsiwala enjoyed the sport and took it up in school. In 2009, she played her first age-group nationals for Maharashtra and three years later, got into the India U-19 team for the AFC U-19 Women’s Championship qualifiers Round 1 and 2 in Malaysia and Vietnam. The midfielder was also part of the senior national camps in 2016 and 2017, but couldn’t get into the squad.

In 2017, while also pursuing a hotel management degree from the DY Patil college, Arsiwala realised football alone would not be able to pay bills. She sought an alternate career, and zeroed in on an unlikely option for an active athlete: studying strength and conditioning.

“I saw that divide where players do well when they are young, but the moment they come in U-17 category, the performance dips. That has to do a lot with aspects like conditioning and nutrition. That’s when my partner and I decided that we want to study further in this field,” she says.

The same year, Arsiwala took up an online course in Performance Enhancement Specialization at the US-based National Academy of Sports Medicine. She and D'souza, also a footballer, then set up Mannybee, a fitness centre that offers services online and on ground with tie-ups with some turf grounds in the city. In 2019, they got the contract from U Mumba to look after the strength and conditioning of its city-based football club, its franchise in the Pro Volleyball League and eventually, the U Mumba kabaddi team.

Was there even an iota of hesitation for Arsiwala breaking into a sport largely perceived as being male-dominated? “Never,” pat comes the reply. “Because all my life I’ve played with men and have had coaches who are men. So from my end, working with an all-male team was normal; just like any other project.

“The support from the technical coaches and management was important, because if you’re constantly battling for two things—to make your space in an all-male team and to do your job correctly, it can’t happen when either is not happening. Luckily, that hasn’t been the case with me,” she says.

Arsiwala labels strength and conditioning as an ever-evolving field that entails continuous learning. More so for a trainer with a football-centric background working with a bunch of elite kabaddi athletes. Arsiwala needed to first understand the body structure of a kabaddi player, its requirements and then curate exercises based on that.

“In football, you need aerobic endurance; change of direction, sprinting, moving, jogging on a bigger field of play. Kabaddi needs anaerobic endurance; you need that explosive strength on a smaller space. Kabaddi players require strength and power but also the ability to move swiftly on the mat,” she says.

Arsiwala focusses on three main aspects with the U Mumba players: injury prevention exercises (the hip area is most vulnerable, she says), compound training methods (snatches, bench presses, battle ropes, etc) and agility sessions. The pandemic forced a lot of these sessions to be conducted online over the past couple of years, but she sensed a level of comfort develop with the members of the squad once that “wall” crumbled. “Now they come up to me and my partner and ask things,” she says with a smile.

Arsiwala has found joy in the strength and conditioning gig with kabaddi, but hasn’t completely given up on her footballing journey yet, still being active in the city’s club circuit. However, if made to pick sides, she’d go with the former. “Because that is my career,” she says.

And she wishes to see more women venture into careers that don’t fit into the conventional boundaries. “I hope kabaddi becomes a women-driven sport too,” Arsiwala says. “And if any young girl wants to get into the field that I am in, I would never stop her because it is always evolving. The scope is endless.”

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