Badminton Ace – Saina Nehwal
There has been a lot of clamour lately about Saina Nehwal‘s new Iodex UltraGel advertisement. The ad features Saina wearing a ‘smiling joker’ facemask to hide her pain during the play. Its tagline goes ‘Iodex UltraGel apnao, dil se muskurao’ (use Iodex UltraGel, smile heartily).
Leo Burnett’s well-crafted #MaskmyPain social media campaign with the iconic Indian Badminton player however baffled the audience!
Ace shuttler in the latest Iodex Ultra Gel Mask TVC:
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1dA-G5asDRU]
Though keenly sought by the agencies, Saina Nehwal endorses only a few, handpicked brands. In the industry highly biased to cricketers, she is one of the top paid non-cricketing sports players for endorsements in the country. The Badminton champ represents Yonex Sportswear, Deccan Chronicle, Airtel, Top Ramen Noodles, Emami Fast Relief, Adani Wilmar’s Fortune Plus, Indian Overseas Bank, Bharat Petroleum Corporation Limited, Iodex, P&G’s Whisper, Vaseline, Sahara India Pariwar, Collectabillia, Herbalife, Jaypee Cement, among others. She has been part of several social awareness campaigns as well such as ‘Meri Beti Meri Shakti’.
Creating ripples with her talent, the 24-year-old Badminton player is a youth icon with whopping three million Facebook fans, and 254K Twitter followers!
Saina Nehwal’s ordeals in training and hard work paid off when her talent got into limelight with the winning of The Junior Czech Open in 2003. Following a restricted diet and a rigorous fitness regime, Saina reached the pinnacle of her career beating more seasoned contemporaries with her exquisite style and perfect technique.
The ace shuttler made every Indian proud becoming the first Indian woman to win Philippines Open, a 4-star tournament, in 2006. That was just onset of many more laurels she was to bring to the country. The then 19-year old became the first Indian to win a BWF Super Series title at the Indonesia Open, in 2009. Her other achievements being a bronze at 2010 Asian Championship, gold at 2010 Commonwealth Games, 2010-12 Swiss Open Gold, 2014 India Grand Prix Gold and so on. She put her birthplace Hisar in Haryana on the world map winning a bronze at the 2012 London Olympics. These career records elucidate her phenomenal dedication toward the badminton sport and zeal to succeed.
Saina Nehwal has been garnered with the nation’s highest respected wearing prizes for a sports person, including the prestigious Rajiv Gandhi Khel Ratna, Arjuna Award, and Padma Shri awards.
You can read her autobiography titled, ‘Playing to Win’ – my life… on and off court.
Watch the ad stories below that run around her real life and render her simple nature.
Restrictions of a world-class player in this crispy Fortune Plus Lite oil advert:
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M_Jp2KOg–s]
The athlete in Airtel 3G ad:
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7i4CKyuXC3U]
Saina Nehwal in Vaseline Total Mositure commercial:
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V-bd8WBN8m0]
Adding masala in the Top Ramen TVC:
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6SNufW-h8So]
An emotional Indian Overseas Bank – Exhibition Game ad:
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8_coqpXQeBE]
Yonex saw the potential in the world champion and sponsored Saina her first racket kit! Here’s a SCBA Train video by Yonex (SunriseClick):
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rxGja1TTEro]
Saina Nehwal currently holds 8th position in the Badminton World Federation (BWF) women’s singles rankings. We wish her all success. 🙂