India at Paris Olympics, Day 12: Pain of weight gain denies Vinesh Phogat a slice of history

New Delhi: As she naturally weighs around 56-57kg and had to drop down a category for Paris Olympics, Vinesh Phogat knew she had a battle in her hands to maintain her weight. But even in her nightmares she wouldn’t have dreamt of being disqualified for being overweight by a mere 100 grams.

She and the Indian medical team did all they could to bring her weight down to 50kg from 52.7kg, an increase of 2.7kg after her three wins en route to the final.

Desperate measures to reduce weight

Phogat didn’t chew a morsel of food neither did she drank a cup of water, instead she exercised throughout Tuesday night, undertook sauna bath, cut her hair and even wore short clothes at the weigh-in.

But as she was fated to be wronged nothing could bring the weighing scale down to 50. It stopped cruelly at 50.1, destroying Vinesh’s hopes of eligible to take to the mat for the biggest bout of her career.

She had to hospitalised for pushing herself to the limit as uncompromising rules prevented her from not only playing in the gold medal match but also denied her a silver, which would also have been a historic maiden one for India in female Olympic wrestling.

The 29-year-old was stripped of not only a medal but also all her match scores and consigned to the bottom of the standings, in line with tournament regulations.

‘Part of the game’

Appeals and complaints were lodged, protests were made, probes demanded and conspiracy theories were floated but Vinesh knew nothing would give her back the opportunity.

So she was reportedly calm on learning her fate, telling women’s national coach Virender Dahiya and Manjeet Rani that it was “part of the game”.

“We met Vinesh and tried to console her. She was brave. She told us, ‘it’s hard luck that we missed the medal, but it is part of the game’,” Dahiya revealed to PTI.

Vinesh might be philosophical now but she would think her moment of glory had passed? Particularly after two earlier failed attempts in Rio 2026 and Tokyo 2020.

Olympics future unknown

Would she be determined enough to carry on till Los Angeles 2028 to have another crack at an Olympic medal, after seeing the way Antim Panghal, who had won the quota for Vinesh’s preferred 53 weight category, heckled around in the round of 16?

India would pray she retains the fire in her belly that saw her lead a year and a half long protest that led to the loosening of Brij Bhushan Sharan Singh’s grip on the Wrestling Federation and India and determination to beat the seemingly unbeatable defending champion Yui Susaki of Japan.

The other Indians in fray on Wednesay, including the women’s table tennis team and athletes Jyothi Yarraji, Annu Rani, Sarvesh Kushare, Priyanka and Suraj Panwar couldn’t exhibit that kind of resolve.

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 Vinesh Phogat was disqualified from playing in the 50kg gold medal wrestling match at Paris Olympics for being overweight by 100 grams.  Other Sports Sports News: Latest Cricket News, Cricket Live Score, Sports Breaking News from Sports Today