Body language

FEBRUARY 25 had Kapil Dev Nikhanj heaving with a cough and cold, an evil combine that has probably tripped up more sports performances than any other human malady. Others would have called it a day: Kapil Dev did six laps around the Wankhede Stadium in Bombay's muggy, polluted heat. The cough and cold fled and he subsequently became one of the more enthusiastic participants in the conditioning camp for the New Zealand tour.

Exactly 17 days before the cold, Kapil had taken his 432nd Test wicket and busted Sir Richard Hadlee's record set during the 1988-89 series in Bangalore. This at 35 - an age when galloping atrophy forces a cricketer to hang up his bat, when his fat:muscle ratio mutinies, his shoulder muscles pack up under inflammation, his knee rages under weight, his wrists creak, his back is as stiff as a plank. Lately, for Kapil, too, outswingers have become difficult, and he has lost rev over the years.

"His determination is unbelievable," says Ali Irani, the Indian crick- et team's official physiotherapist. "At times, I've felt that even when he was only 60 per cent fit, he has played the match and produced results." Kapil has missed only 13 days of international cricket.

In June 1990 came Kapil's medical apotheosis: the entire Indian team underwent a battery of physiological tests - aerobic capacity, the treadmill, motor ability, strength, fat analysis, and pulmonary and cardiovascular fitness - and Kapil was in the first three, despite being the elderly codger of the team, says P S M Chandran of the Sports Authority of India (SAI).

Chandran observes that of the three body types - ectomorph, mesomorph and endomorph - starting from marathoner lean and running to surno fat, Kapil is the average of both extremes. "The mesomorph," says Gursharan Singh, the former cricket coach at the National Institute of Sports, "has the best potential to develop into a pace bowler."
Early foundation The foundations were laid early in Chandigarh, when the adolescent Kapil ran cross-country to improve his stamina. Playing regular, gruelling sets of squash honed endurance; table tennis and badminton sharpened reflexes and perception. Barring five arthroscopic knee surgeries and a bagful of the usual minor, niggling injuries, Kapil Dev's career has been smooth.

His weight: height ratio falls well within the optimum