japans momiji nishiya and brazils rayssa leal both 13yearold girls won gold and silver in the womens skateboarding at the tokyo olympics in fact most of the skateboarders in the category that debuted at the tokyo olympics are in their teens with the bronze medalist in that event being japans funa nakayama 16this truly makes one wonder what were we doing when we were 13an upside to the introduction of this rebel sport in the worlds greatest sporting extravaganza is the fact that it has induced a fresh rush of adrenaline among the citys young skateboarders for instance sarthak sumi 22 has been surfing the streets since he was 16 when a friend in jampshedpur introduced him to the sport we learnt every move from youtube as there was no instructor in jamshedpurthen i came to kolkata for higher studies hoping that i would get someone to train under but the situation was the same here he told us and though he and others skateboarders in the city had slowly lost all hope of taking up the sport professionally the tokyo olympics has stirred them into action againolympics a game changeranup parida 22 who has been skateboarding since 2017 said now people will take the sport seriously despite several international skateboarding tournaments being held every year the olympics have given this sport and everyone associated with it an identity i think its a game changerthe skateboarding scene in kolkata had received a boost when an american aaron walling who had come to the city to work for an ngo started training some local kids in a warehouse at lake gardens it was started as a community building programme that soon got many takers but aaron returned to the us in 2016 and the group slowly disintegrated but now the olympics has changed all that people have started talking about the sport and taking it seriously said sudhyasheel sen who runs a creative agency and was one of the core members of aarons teampeople have already started talking about the sport on social media and even our videos and photos are getting more views and reactions sudhyasheel addedyoutube the only coachafter aaron left the core members of his club started teaching what they had learnt from him to the youngsters but there was no one else to help youtube is our only source of information we watch videos and try to copy the moves if we had a professional coach things would have been much different said sarthakwe dont have a place to trainthere are several skateboarding institutes and skate parks in most indian metros but in kolkata theres nothing we asked the state government for help but havent received anything said samarjit biswas another citybased skateboarder and without proper infrastructure skateboarding has become largely a roadside sport in the city the citys skateboarders usually practise and teach the sport in the rabindra sarobar lake area the guards and morning walkers regularly complain about us and we cant go back to