Trishna Bharadia, between the hockey field and dancing on TV!
Trishna Bharadia is not just your regular hockey player, she is also a TV dancer! This is one interesting combination of hockey and dancing skills! This is her story…
I’ve been involved in hockey literally all my life. My Dad has played since being at university (and still plays now – as well as playing club hockey, he also plays nationally for Wales in the over-65s Masters age group!). Some of my earliest childhood memories are of him taking myself and my sisters to watch his matches on a Saturday. He used to chop down his old sticks (in those days they were wooden!) for us to play with. We’re very much a hockey family. Both my sisters have also played and my parents own Thames Valley Sports, which is a specialist sports shop that has hockey as one of its main sports.
I started to play competitive league hockey during a period of residence in the Netherlands between when I was 12 and 14 years old. The set-up there is fantastic and that’s where I became serious about my hockey. After returning to the UK, I went on to play for my school, university, county and various clubs, and I’ve also captained several sides. I’ve played indoor league hockey too and for many years ran a mixed team at one of the clubs I played at. Some of the clubs that I’ve played at are VCL and MHC Forescate (both in the Netherlands), and Harlow HC, Maidenhead HC, South Bucks HC, Sale HC, Eastcote HC and Indian Gymkhana HC in the UK.
I’ve played in every position (even in goal once!) and although I’m naturally a winger or centre forward, as I’ve grown older and partly as a result of adjustments I’ve had to make due to having been diagnosed with Multiple Sclerosis in 2008, I’ve gradually moved further back along the pitch and have been playing in defence for several years now!
In terms of dancing on TV, that came about because I was nominated by my sister to take part in the first ever “People’s Strictly for Comic Relief.” It was a charity spin-off of the BBC1 show “Strictly Come Dancing” (known abroad as “Dancing with the Stars”) and she nominated me for all the charity work that I’ve done since being diagnosed with MS. Although I’ve been doing Zumba for about three or four years now, I’ve never had any professional Latin/Ballroom dance training and actually never even had the confidence to get up and dance at parties until I was introduced to clubbing at university!? So dancing the jive in front of millions of viewers was definitely being thrown in at the deep end!
I really enjoyed the experience though and it made me realise just how much I’ve come to love dancing just as much as I love hockey!
In terms of plans for the future, I actually really enjoyed the TV side of things with People’s Strictly, and if there were opportunities to take part in one-off presenting projects then I’d be love to do that! I’m currently taking a break from hockey for various reasons. Things have become very busy in terms of the charity work I do because being on TV really raised the profile of MS and the charities that I collaborate with. I can only manage to do so much so I’m going to be playing more socially for the time being, and make the most of the momentum created by the show for taking on more charity work. I could never let hockey out of my life completely though!
