Indian Athletics Thread ...

[jayakris]

https://www.espn.com/athletics/story/_/ ... mpionships

Robert is even more bullish. "She will touch and go past 6.83 in another 2-3 years. But she will cross the 7m mark in three years. This I can guarantee," he said following her medal ceremony.

I don't know man. She is being coached by a guy who was away from coaching for a long time (doing his regular job), and now back to coaching only for the past 4 years. Is he up on the developments around the world in long jump? Somebody needs to convince Bobby to go get some coaching training abroad (or he should let Shaili be coached at least part-time by somebody good abroad). Bobby seems to be very sincere about what he is trying to do, and it looks like Anju and Bobby truly care for Shaili. But I don't know if that will be enough. Bobby is the only coach from India who even comes close to my qualification for coaching an Olympics medal prospect we have, but even in his case, I would rather not take the risk. I would make sure that Shaili gets the proper coaching abroad NOW, before her techniques are all way too fixed and cannot change much. Hope India will come up with the money, and somebody will convince Bobby to be her manager-coach rather than her technical-coach.

[Kumar]

Good discussion on Hima Das. Basically, things don't add up in Hima's case, right? Something weird is there, that we don't know well. I think Mugu has always been a bit unconvinced of something or other, when it came to Hima (though I am not sure if he has implied that there is a spinach issue). Not sure what is really going on.

Mugu paints a picture that is pretty depressing. I am still inclined to give her benefit of doubt and hopefully she proves us all wrong.

[Mugundan]

a. opinions on a white Italian winning the 100m and 4x100m; and the sudden influx of very good white sprinters in both the men and women.

I am not answering for Mugu. Jacobs is probably not 100% white. He has an (African?)-American father and Italian mother. His heart is 100% Italian for sure.

Yes, in the US, he would be classified as African American (rather than as "white") based on his dad being African American.

the point about Jacobs is his progression. Foru years ago he was a 10.82 sprinter. Today, 9.80! Four years ago, even in India there were around 35 sprinters better than 10.82, whether vegetarians or not! Su Bingtian ran 9.83 in Tokyo for an Asian record. His first sub-10 was in 2015. By any yardstick, Jacobs's rise is phenomenal and thus the doubts. This does not mean the others are not on veg diet. Most of them must be!

[Mugundan]

Must add here (didn't notice it earlier), that 10.82 was into a headwind of 3.2m/s. A more resonable comparison would be with his 10.23 in 2016. He moved from 10.10 in 2020 to 9.80s in 2021 while Su Bingtian (at present the only non-Black athlete in the top lists) moved from 10.10 in 2014 to 9.99 in 2015, 9.91 AR in 2018 and now 9.83AR in 2021.

[Sin Hombre]

Yeah those improvements are nonsensical and likely most of the Italians are on spinach and won't be able to replicate these performances post-Covid.

[prasen9]

Good point. I hadn't thought about that aspect. She was at 51.42s at the U20 worlds. Hence the question. (Athing Mu is only 19! I wonder what she will be doing at her peak.)

Some parents are very cruel. Why would you name your child "a thing"?

[suresh]

Some parents are very cruel. Why would you name your child "a thing"?

I think her folks are from Sudan and it might be a regular name there.

[prasen9]

Sure. I was just joking.

[suresh]

Sure. I was just joking.

I know!

[Mugundan]

Here's a sprinter who has suddenly come up to 10.28s for the 100m! Services championships often produce some sensational results but once into the mainstream of Indian national campers and national competitions these athletes do not come up to expectations.
Doubts arise when athletes are competing for the first time this season as some of these athletes were in this meet.
https://sportstar.thehindu.com/athletic ... 312803.ece

[srini]

Why can't our silly media and journos let Neeraj focus on his training by making up all this non-sense ? Cringe worthiness of Indian media is at peaks now!

https://www.ndtv.com/offbeat/neeraj-cho ... ay-2531129

I think Neeraj for once made a wrong decision of not continuing with the athletics season by escaping from India. Most of his peers have been competing at Paris diamond league etc last couple of weeks. I guess he is human after all enjoying all the spotlight on him.

[Atithee]

I watched a similar question by a lady anchor but not as direct. He was coy and handled it very well.

[jayakris]

Here's a sprinter who has suddenly come up to 10.28s for the 100m! Services championships often produce some sensational results but once into the mainstream of Indian national campers and national competitions these athletes do not come up to expectations.
Doubts arise when athletes are competing for the first time this season as some of these athletes were in this meet.
https://sportstar.thehindu.com/athletic ... 312803.ece

So, what is the story on this guy KS Pranav. I find that he was the national school sports meet 100m winner (with Jisna Mathew on the girl's side) at Kozhikode in 2015, six years ago, and had a 10.84s then. I can't find anything on him after that. Where was he?

[Orang]

An interesting take. Most of these athletes are young and will have another chance in 2024:

https://sportscafe.in/athletics/article ... r-far-more

Let's start with men's 20km walk. India had fielded three athletes - Rahul Rohilla, Sandeep Kumar and KT Irfan. Sandeep and Irfan are national record holders with timing of 1.20.16, whereas the duo were roughly 10 minutes slower than their best in Japan. To their dismay, all three medals went to a timing lower than their PBs.

Similar was the case in women's 20km walk. Two participants - Priyanka Goswami and Bhawana Jat - entered the competition with PBs of 1:28:45 and 1:29:54. In the Olympics, all three medals were decided within the range of 1:29:12 to 1:29:57. That means India could have pocketed two more here.

Murali Shreeshankar, the national record holder in the long jump has a PB of 8.26m. This distance would have fetched him a bronze at the Olympics. While the lad could only manage a leap of 7.69m, the bronze went to Cuba's Maykel Masso, with a distance of 8.21m.

Women's discus thrower Kamalpreet Kaur had set a national record a month before the Olympics at 66.59m. But in the final of the Olympics, her best effort was recorded at 63.70m. Had she equaled her PB, she would have taken the bronze. But it went to Cuba's Yaime Perez with a throw of 65.72m.

[Atithee]

Or that the PBs are dubious and their real capabilities are what they achieved at Olympics.