A phone call jolted me awake early one morning in July 2016. “You must meet this guy. He’s tall, good looking, humble. Above all, he’s your future athletics superstar. Javelin phekta hai. It’ll be a great photo-op too.” Neeraj Chopra? Javelin? The name didn’t ring a bell. Sounded like a PR pitch. We let it pass. A few days later, this Chopra boy won the World Junior Javelin Gold in Poland with a massive throw of 86.48m. It was a junior world record. Any elite thrower would be proud of that in a Diamond League competition. He was just 18. He returned home a hero. The photo-ops and interviews did happen. Journalists scrambled to find where Khandra village was on Haryana’s map; what he ate, when he slept. After the initial buzz, the excitement died down. Sponsors stayed away; the media was lukewarm. The army stepped up and offered him the job of a junior commissioned officer (JCO) as naib subedar. The boy from humble beginnings was relieved. The future had been secured.
Neeraj could have lost his focus there, the hunger inside him could have been satiated by a government job, as has happened way too often with many talented athletes in the past. But he knew it was just the beginning of his journey. The script was different. This man was different. That was then. Cut to the present, Neeraj Chopra is a superstar. Rockstar, if you like. Yes, he is tall, good looking, and humble. He is also the best in his business, in the world. Neeraj’s story of how he picked up sports as a young boy to fight obesity is well documented. It is well known that he loves choorma made by his mother. It is well known that he loves eating dal and can have bowls of it at a go. That’s not important today. Neeraj has come here with an unprecedented load of expectations. He has won it all – from Asian Games gold to Commonwealth Games gold. He is the defending Olympic champion and a world champion too. He is just 26, at the peak of his prowess.
The past eight years have not been easy for Neeraj, though. The journey of an elite athlete never is. After the Poland spark, Neeraj suffered a back injury. After recovering from that, he won the Asian athletics championship gold with an 85-plus throw. The world championship next was below expectations and then, injury struck again. A groin injury. He was also forced to part ways with his Australian coach Gary Calvert, the man who honed his skills and made him a world athlete. Calvert’s contract was not renewed by the government. He left for China and later died there in 2021. Neeraj had to move on. Now, he was training with Werner Daniels in Germany. After a slight tweak in his technique, Neeraj was ready for bigger challenges. He won the Commonwealth Games gold medal first in May 2018 and followed it up with the Asian Games gold with a best effort of 88.04m. He had become a national star. The focus was now the Tokyo Olympic Games 2020. Neeraj was shaping up well and then suffered another injury. He had to undergo surgery to remove bone spurs in his right elbow in Mumbai in May 2019. There were doubts whether he would be the same on his return. After a six-month rehab and recovery programme, Neeraj joined hands with German biomechanics expert Klaus Bartonietz and went to South Africa to prepare for the Tokyo Games. He returned to competition in January 2020, won it and qualified for the Olympics. Due to the pandemic, the Games were postponed. Neeraj returned home and trained at NIS, Patiala and in Bhubaneswar. He then went to Sweden for training and competition and then went to Japan. A throw of 87.58m was enough to get him the gold. He made it look so easy. He was now just the second Indian after Abhinav Bindra to win an individual Olympic gold.
After Tokyo, Neeraj crossed the final frontier. He won the World athletics gold with a throw of 88.17m. The second Asian Games followed, and his personal best followed. 89.94m, at the Stockholm Diamond League in Sweden in June 2022. All this while the talk had centred around the 90m-mark. When will that come? It was the question he faced everywhere he went. He would take a deep breath and say, it is around the corner. Deep inside, he knew it was irrelevant. It is the medals that matter, not small, little numbers. This year has been a quiet one for Neeraj. He took part in only three competitions on the road to Paris. He finished second in the Doha Diamond League in May with 88.36m and was first in the Paavo Nurmi Games in June with 85.97m. In between, he returned home to take part in the Federation Cup in Bhubaneswar in May. Neeraj’s preparations were hampered by an adductor muscle issue early this year. Is he fit enough to go for gold, or at least a medal? His coach had said a month ago that the adductor niggle was gone. “It is fine, it is looking good. He is having full throwing sessions,” Bartonietz had said. Neeraj is on track. He is ready. The nation will hold its breath and keep fingers crossed when he competes on Thursday here at the Olympic Stadium. Before that, there is this small routine of competing in the qualifications today.
