Javelin thrower Jena eyes fresh glory after breakthrough year

At the beginning of the year, the soft-spoken Kishore Jena would have reacted in disbelief if he had been told he would be a World Championships finalist, leave alone win an Asian Games medal and qualify for the Paris Olympics.

- Shantanu Srivastava

But 12 months is a lifetime in international sport and Jena understands it all too well. From an unfancied competitor at the start of the year to becoming India's No.2 javelin thrower, behind world and Olympic champion Neeraj Chopra, the Odisha thrower has enjoyed a meteoric rise in currently the most popular athletics discipline in the country.

"It does feel like a dream. Earlier, people barely took note of me, but now there are requests for photographs and autographs. It all feels a little surreal. Credit to my coach and well wishers," the 28-year-old says.

"Honestly, if you would have told me at the start of the year that I will have such results in the coming months, I wouldn't have believed. Having said that, in javelin an improvement of 3-4 metres is not unnatural. So, once I started doing well, I knew I could get in the 85-87m range."

Having started the year with a best throw of 78.93m that helped him win the season-opening Indian Open Throws Competition, it turned into a largely subdued season for Jena as he managed to breach the 80m mark just once in his next four competitions.