Joshna Chinappa likes to hit the ball hard…really hard. Not surprising, considering this 19-year-old squash player has a cache of titles to her credit. For a girl who, at the tender age of eight, had already made squash the focus of all her energy, she sure has come a long way. "I used to tag along with my dad, who was a squash player, when he used to go to practise. When I was about seven or eight, I started playing the game myself and I knew immediately that this was what I wanted to do in my life."

'Squash?' you may well ask, seeing that the sport is no more than a blip on the consciousness of Indian sports lovers. "A lot of people are into squash for fitness and exercise so there is a considerable number who do follow the game. But this is not specifically an Indian phenomenon, it is the same the world over." Joshna herself is no stranger to fame, having smashed her way into reckoning with a fair share of titles: the British Open under-17 title (2003), SAF Games in Pakistan, the Senior National winner and the Malaysian Junior winner (2004), British Open Junior winner and the Asian Junior winner (2005)…. The list goes on.

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