Asian Games 2018- Champions Of Their Own Making

A trickle of precious gold at the Asiad could herald a gush of metal. Remarkably, our athletes are backed by self-serving official apathy, callousness and greed.

- Qaiser Mohammad Ali

When it comes to sports, India is fortunate that its athletes find a way to overcome the impediments that its officialdom throws in their paths—whole areas fraught with politics and unprofessionalism. If India had won 10 medals (3 gold, 3 silver, 4 bronze) by the end of the third day of the Asian Games, it has been possible in spite of official bungling, due to athletes’ own talent, resilience and steely determination. The government does provide facilities and exposure, but it’s a mite compared to the odds athletes face.

Many of the stories of the Games medal winners so far, and those who may or may not win, are tales of victories carved thr­ ough adversity. The story of 65kg freestyle wrestler Bajrang Punia, who won India’s first gold in Jakarta and ace shooter Ravi Kumar, who opened India’s medal ac­ count at the Asian Games in the mixed 10m air rifle bronze with Apurvi Chandela, are two of them (see profiles).

Even the feat of 16­year­old Saurabh Chaudhary, who created a sensational upset in the men’s 10m air pistol to shoot gold, is one of trumping against odds. On his Asian Games debut, the shy Meerut­ based teenager beat legendary Jongoh Jin of Korea, a four­time Oly m pic gold medallist, and two­time world champion Tomayuki Matsuda of Japan, to climb atop the podium at Palembang’s Jaka ba­ ring shooting range on August 21. Saurabh first topped the qualification round with a superb 586/600 points and then stun­ned everyone in the finals with a Games record score of 240.7 points. “I didn’t think of who I was shooting with, whether they were Olympic or world champions,” says Saurabh, who had won gold at the Junior World Cup in 2018.

Two days before Saurabh’s finest hour, the redoubtable Bajrang Punia—back pain threw him out of the mat for eight months in 2015, a towering adversity— clinched the 65kg freestyle gold.