Pre-mortem on the Paris Olympics disaster

[suresh]

I do not think the universities have any sporting infrastructure. Most universities that is. All we have is perhaps an outdoor track and a few soccer/cricket fields. Rather useless with respect to the other Olympics sports.

IITM has the following: 1. A good quality astro turf track, 2. Multiple tennis courts (hard), 3. Multiple basketball courts (not of high quality), 4. Football and hockey field, 5. A cricket pitch that is used and maintained by a Division 1 team, 6. A top class squash court, 7. Average badminton courts that is shared with other activities.

[Atithee]

Suresh, no swimming pool?

[suresh]

Suresh, no swimming pool?

Forgot! Olympic size swimming pool.

[prasen9]

So, what academies can we set up there? Tennis and badminton + squash among individual sports. Football, hockey, and track and field. And swimming. None of these except badminton and hockey and may be track and field are ones where we should invest. We need to set up more shooting, archery, boxing, weightlifting academies along with a few other sports. I guess we could use an existing gym and try to set up something related to boxing and weightlifting. But the others including cycling, etc. will need facilities. And coaches.

Swimming is useless. We are never going to win medals at the Olympics in some time. It is useful as a cross-training, general athletic ability, rehab, etc. sense.

[jayakris]

^^ Archery is one on which we need to set up a bunch of centers. It is a sport that likely is not affected by any DNA deficiencies we may have (which I am pretty sure affects our performance in several sports). But our population comes in handy in Archery. There has got to be some good ones that can continue emerge, if we let 3 or 4 times as many kids check out archery (and go beyond just the Jharkhand population!). All we need is some 3 Komalikas and Deepikas to come up every 4 years instead of one. At least one of them at least may come through at Olympics/Asiad, and we will always contend for some team medals.

I don't know what other sports we should spread around the country. Shooting can have some more reach in the country. Fencing certainly!!! Wrestling, maybe. There may be other population segments, outside Haryana, with the right genetics, where wrestlers could emerge (certain genetics of the Haryana population segment currently plays a part in our success). Women's boxing etc can have more kids taking part. Volleyball is one where we actually may have a lot more potential than we are bringing to fruition. Golf could be one, but it needs Golf courses and we have very few, and they are expensive. We could set up a bunch of golf ranges within our cities (places like Korea have golfing ranges within 5 acre type land - and so many of them in every city) and see if some more kids will try out and we could identify some good ones.

[sameerph]

^
I don't know what other sports we should spread around the country. Shooting can have some more reach in the country. Fencing certainly!!! Wrestling, maybe. There may be other population segments, outside Haryana, with the right genetics, where wrestlers could emerge (certain genetics of the Haryana population segment currently plays a part in our success). Women's boxing etc can have more kids taking part. Volleyball is one where we actually may have a lot more potential than we are bringing to fruition. Golf could be one, but it needs Golf courses and we have very few, and they are expensive. We could set up a bunch of golf ranges within our cities (places like Korea have golfing ranges within 5 acre type land - and so many of them in every city) and see if some more kids will try out and we could identify some good ones.

Maharashtra has a tradition in wrestling. India's only individual olympic medalist for a long time ( till Leander), Khashaba Jadhav was from Maharashtra. And areas in South Western Maharshtra around Kolhapur still has a lot of wrestling tournaments ( many in mud I think). So, with right coaching they can come close to the level of Haryana wrestlers. Success of Sushil and Yogeshwar Dutt really gave a philip for wrestling in Haryana. So, if a wrestler from Maharashtra can come up and win a medal at an olympics or at least to start with at an Asian games then many more should follow.

Wrestling is a sport where we have won a medal at each of the last 4 olympics. So, we have to maintain that and try to go up and try getting 3-4 medals at an olympics. 3 was possible this time too but Vinesh faltered.

P.S. Should we move this to Tokyo olympics thread as this is not only about archery now ?

[prasen9]

Weightlifting is on shaky grounds, but they took steps to formalize a constitution and stay in the good books of the IOC. New life for olympics

[srini]

As we step into Olympics qualifications year, i think we again run into the risk of not adding any new sports that we qualify with medal winning potential. We just keep qualifying for the same old Archery,Badminton,Boxing,Hockey,Shooting, weightlifting and Wrestling but we keep churning out more qualifiers in those sports olympics after olympics. Of these we have medal chances only in Boxing and Wrestling as we all know by know Shooters and archers make it in BIG numbers only to make our disappointment BIGGER everytime.

I think we have probably regressed in Wresling, due to non-exposure thanks to the Visa Fiasco for U-23 World championship in Spain in Oct'22.

I'm not sure if its the association or the Spanish colonialists responsible for this. The reason given was Spanish Consulate feared that the athletes may stay beyond their Visa expiry. I don't know what those consular officers were smoking when they imagined that Indian athletes would want to stay put on their own in an energy deprived God forsaken EU country and that too during winter!

Anyways, any predictions from forum members on whether we can cross the 7 Tokyo medals?

[Saffron Lenin]

Mark my words we will win 20+ medals.....
Save my comment for 2024

[Atithee]

Don’t know what the Spanish consulate officers were smoking but I’d sure like to have some of what Saffron Lenin is smoking.

[srini]

Don’t know what the Spanish consulate officers were smoking but I’d sure like to have some of what Saffron Lenin is smoking.

[sameerph]

As we step into Olympics qualifications year, i think we again run into the risk of not adding any new sports that we qualify with medal winning potential. We just keep qualifying for the same old Archery,Badminton,Boxing,Hockey,Shooting, weightlifting and Wrestling but we keep churning out more qualifiers in those sports olympics after olympics. Of these we have medal chances only in Boxing and Wrestling as we all know by know Shooters and archers make it in BIG numbers only to make our disappointment BIGGER everytime.

I think we have probably regressed in Wresling, due to non-exposure thanks to the Visa Fiasco for U-23 World championship in Spain in Oct'22.

I'm not sure if its the association or the Spanish colonialists responsible for this. The reason given was Spanish Consulate feared that the athletes may stay beyond their Visa expiry. I don't know what those consular officers were smoking when they imagined that Indian athletes would want to stay put on their own in an energy deprived God forsaken EU country and that too during winter!

Anyways, any predictions from forum members on whether we can cross the 7 Tokyo medals?

Too early to call anything right now. It has been less than one and and half years since last olympics and more time left for next olympics. So, there was not much scope for anything to change since last olympics. We can start making predictions from June-July next year.

As for wrestling, I do not think we will regress only because we could not participate in 1 tournament. Overall,2 wrestlers who won medals at Tokyo-Ravi and Bajrang will still be in hunt at Paris mostly. Bajrang still won a medal at latest world championships although Ravi had a disappointing loss.
There is good amount of talent coming up in juniors, so hope we can retain that 2 medal haul from wrestling.

Neeraj Chopra and Meerabai Chanu are still very much in hunt for world medals. 1 medal in boxing as we had last time is not a big ask.

Will be tough for Sindhu to repeat her medal and someone else - Lakshya/Satwik-Chirag have to stand up.

Hockey team seems to have regressed a bit over their Tokyo form.

Overall, we are pretty much 7 medal level I think. For bigger improvement, we need to get 2-3 medals from shooting. We are performing at world level in shooting and we did win 1 gold in recent shooting world championships. So, it is wrong to equate shooting with archery. In archery, we have never ever won a medal at olympics and hardly won much in Asian games. Shooting is different. We have faltered in last 2 olympics, but hope we come back next time and win some.

[srini]

Qualifying standards for athletics are published.
Avinash Sable in 3000m steeplechase,Murali Sreeshankar in Long jump, Neeraj Chopra in Javelin have already achieved qualification marks with good enough buffer means they will be in contention for a good placing or a final if not for a medal.

Manpreet Kaur in shotput ,Priyanka Goswami in 20km Race Walk have barely made it.

It doesn't mean all the above are already qualified since they need to achieve these qualifying marks after this Dec31 until qualification period ends. Rest of the athletes will be vying to achieve the qualifying marks with the help of Spinach and liberal measurement of time and distance measurements by friendly guys in domestic competitions. They will go on to become the OLYMPIANs who compete in making fouls in the Olympics.

[Sin Hombre]

When are the next world championships sameer?

[rajitghosh]

This may be a pre-mortem for the Asian Games disaster followed by the Olympics disaster but Indian sports seems to be hitting a nadir again.
After yesterday's underwhelming performance in hockey I have doubts on their chances of Olympic qualification. The wrestling federation has its own set of scandals to handle and medals in wrestling from here on would be a bonus. The badmintom team after last year's highs in the Thomas Cup and Commonwealth Games and clearly sliding. Sindhu and Srikanth are past their prime. Saina already was. Lakshya Sen I think has been figured out by opponents and doesn't post a threat any more. I had hopes on SatChi but Satvik is injury prone. In weightlifting also with weight categorie being re-adjusted not sure what Mirabai Chanu's chances are. That leaves Neeraj Chopra as the only genuine medal prospect in the Olympics provided he doesn't get injured.
Of course in tennis there would be no soap opera this time with Saina retiring and the male players also hitting rock bottom.