Janvi Jindal was just eight years old when her family went on a trip to Rishikesh with several other families. While most people were excited about river rafting, Janvi was too young to participate. Instead, she was allowed to try cliff jumping into the river.
There were two jumping points – 20 feet and 30 feet high. Most people managed one jump, some two. Janvi completed three jumps with complete confidence and wanted to continue even further. The only reason she stopped was that the group had to move on. That day, her parents realised that there was something special about their daughter. They understood that she needed a sport that would match her adventurous personality.
Finding The Right Sport
Janvi’s father wanted her to have energy to go into something meaningful. Therefore, he introduced freestyle skating into her life after exploring a lot of options. But it turned out quite challenging as there was no freestyle skating coach available in Chandigarh or the nearby regions. Rather than seeing this as a roadblock, her father decided to become the solution himself.
Without any prior knowledge of skating, he started learning freestyle skating from online videos, tutorials, and international skating content. He spent countless nights learning the techniques to pass on to Janvi the next day.
The Challenges In Learning
Janvi’s journey in freestyle skating was anything but easy. Her early years were all about falls, bruises, cuts, and endless practice sessions. Despite facing challenges every day, she knew giving up was never an option. Her father motivated her that pain only lasts a few moments, but the progress stays forever.
Also, the lack of resources, like no world-class facilities or any professional training centres, didn’t become a hurdle for her. She would practice in shopfronts, public roads and open spaces. This shows that she didn’t wait for perfect conditions, but rather learned to make the most of what she had.
Rising As A Champion
In 2019, Janvi faced one of the toughest moments of her young career. She was diagnosed with dengue and had to be hospitalised just days before her National Championship. She had spent an entire year preparing for the event and didn’t want the effort to go to waste. Only ten days after leaving the hospital, she showed up on the competition floor. What followed surprised everyone.
Competing in her very first Nationals, Janvi won the gold medal and became a National Champion. At that very moment, she proved that if you have the determination, you can achieve the impossible.
“During the COVID lockdown, when training space was limited to my home, I merged my Punjabi dance style, Bhangra, with skating and received the State Award for this innovation,” mentions Janvi.
Despite winning medals consistently at the national level, international opportunities remained out of reach. Financial limitations made advanced training difficult, and many opportunities had to be left behind. The repeated delays broke her spirit for a while, but this setback gave her a new direction. If she couldn’t go international, she would prove her worth to the world in another way, and that led her to register her name in Guinness World Records.
Her first attempt in 2024 got rejected, but she didn’t quit. She tried again. And then again. Slowly, one record turned into multiple records, and before turning eighteen, she achieved eleven Guinness World Records. In doing so, she became India’s highest Guinness World Record-holding girl and the second-highest Guinness World Record-holding sportsperson in the country after Sachin Tendulkar.
Determination Over Perfection
Today, Janvi doesn’t want to stop, but rather go higher and higher. She dreams of representing India on bigger international stages in the future. But regardless of what lies ahead, she has already proven that you don’t need perfect conditions to achieve extraordinary things.
