Javelin thrower Neeraj Chopra is hoping to break India’s athletics duck at the Olympic Games in Tokyo, hoping to win the country’s first medal in track and field post independence.
While Norman Pritchard’s hurdles medal in 1900 is credited to India by the official body the International Olympic Committee, independent India have never won an athletics medal, coming close on quite a few occasions.
After sprinter Milkha Singh in 1958 and discus thrower Vikas Gowda in 2014, the former world junior champion became only the third man to win gold for India in Commonwealth Games athletics.
“It was my first Commonwealth Games and I started thinking about how hard I had worked to get to that moment,” Chopra told Reuters in an interview, speaking of his experience at the Carrara Stadium in Gold Coast.
“The happiest thought for me was that I had made history by winning the first javelin gold.” Two of the country’s two most famous track stars – Milkha Singh and PT Usha – missed podium places at the Olympics by the narrowest of margins.
Both finished fourth, Singh in the 400 metres at the 1960 Rome Olympics, while Usha finished in the same position after the 400 metres hurdles final in Los Angeles.
“We have athletics medal in every event... be it Asian Games, Commonwealth Games, world championships,” said Chopra. “So the main aim is to win an Olympic medal. I can’t even imagine what that would mean to track-and-field in the country. People keep telling me that the person who wins an Olympic medal will probably become the god of athletics.
“Athletes like Milkha Singh and PT Usha came fourth in Olympics but everyone knows them. So if coming fourth in Olympics means so much I don’t know what a medal can do.”
Chopra will be taking part in the Doha Diamond League later this year and a few other meets in order to prepare for the Asiads. “Focus and training is going to be most important. I have to give up everything and just concentrate on my training,” he said.
“To achieve something so huge, I would need to do something different. I have to throw 90 plus metres consistently at different tournaments.”
Chopra also spoke about the importance of training and hoped to go abroad to train in a better climate, “I am hoping I can train outside the country. It’s going to get too hot here, so it would be good if I can go somewhere in Europe where the weather would help my training.”
“The most difficult part of the journey has been at the start. From reaching the ground, to my diet, everything was difficult. After that I got used to everything.
“At the start of our careers we don’t even get coaches. We didn’t even have too many performances to look up to at a competitive level.”