India all-rounder Hardik Pandya remained tight-lipped on matters that kept him in limelight in recent times except for fitness here on Saturday, his impassive countenance masking his feelings as he tackles myriad challenges both on and off the field.
For a player who has been a hot topic of discussion with all that has transpired of late, Pandya sported a pleasant smile and spoke at length on fitness while launching his sports apparel brand.
Two days ago, Pandya and Natasa Stankovic officially announced their separation after four years of marriage, and just before that, he lost out to Suryakumar Yadav in the race to become the captain of the Indian T20 team for the upcoming tour of Sri Lanka.
On Saturday though, it was all about fitness for him.
"When our body does not get tired, our mind gets tired. So, so many times in my life, the difference between when I was able to push my limits was always the fact that when my mind gets tired, I will tell my body to just push because you will always have extra effort in your body," Pandya said.
"The difference between, if you do 20 and if I do 20, we are on the same level. But if I push to 25 and if I challenge my mindset, next time I'm going to do 25, next time I'm going to do 30," he added.
Ironically, his chances of becoming the captain diminished owing to concerns around fitness, due to which he has not been able to play all three formats of the game and bowl extensively in the limited overs game, especially in ODIs.
Earlier this month, Pandya rejoiced with the T20 World Cup-winning team in an open bus, soaking in the love that lakhs of fans poured on him during India's victory parade.
But a couple of weeks since the ultimate high, Pandya has become a man who has also lost a few significant things.
India's T20 World Cup vice-captain Pandya was perceived as someone who would fill in the big shoes of Rohit Sharma but the news of his removal from leadership role almost coincided with his divorce announcement.
But Pandya showed no impact of all that when he made his first public appearance to launch his sports apparel brand with Fancode here, sharing insights into his fitness even though talks in the Indian cricket circles remain around him being injury-prone.
Only a few months ago Pandya was at the receiving end of fans' wrath for replacing Rohit as Mumbai Indians' captain, but he did not react until he turned it around for himself.
The opportunity arrived with Pandya playing a stellar role in India's World Cup win and that was when he acknowledged that the going had actually been tough.
"The point that it is very, very important to sometime clean your mind as well, that your body has much more than what you can think and that video (he watched as a 16-year-old) stayed with me for so long that, every time in my life, when my trainer is telling me to do 10 push-ups, I've always ended up doing 15," the 30-year-old shared.
"And that has pushed my limits and I think slowly, everyone who wants to start with a fitness journey they should focus on that," said Pandya, adding that his highest score in the Yo-Yo test has been 21.7, only a few notches lesser than the upper limit.
"Start pushing your barrier every single day because the human body is such a lovely creation by god that it will mould however you want (it) to, however you want to have it, it's just that it just needs little hard work," Pandya said.
He may not be new coach Gautam Gambhir's choice for captaincy but he was once described as the "only player in the country to do what he can do" by chief selector Ajit Agarkar.
Pandya shared insights into what drives him.
"I never knew what fitness would do to me, but it's just that I felt it that for me I always wanted to be No. 1 in everything which I do, so in a habit of that, I kept training a lot when I was young, I pushed myself a lot, ran a lot so I had a very good strong base," he said.
"Obviously, there was not much knowledge about the body, not much knowledge about how to increase my fitness, but because my base was strong and I did the basics which you are supposed to do while training, it helped me when I came to the higher level."
"I used to bowl if I'm not wrong 130s; higher 130s, I was able to go 140 plus, 142 by pushing, that's when I realised by 2017 or not as soon as I started getting more more into my body, more knowledge about it and that's when I start pushing," he said.
