Olympics from my perspective

In 2nd grade, my school sports teacher ran into the class giving sweets to all teachers. The news was that India had won an Olympics gold. I was thinking about a lot of questions. I did not know why it was such a big deal. What if someone has won a medal? People win medals all the time. Is shooting even a sport? What if someone shoots at their opponents? And so on. Until a few days back, I did not realise how big a deal it was!

I have loved sports all my life. Although I have never been particularly good at any sport, I have loved playing. I have asked myself this question multiple times, “Why don’t we win medals at the Olympics despite being such a big country?” I know the reasons now, but I want to refrain from writing about them in this blog. I would instead like to write about all the memories I have had of the four Olympic games I have seen and what I have learned from them.

I was in 6th grade when London Olympics happened, and my memory is of those times is pretty faint. I remember spending a lot of time playing Miniclip games (a broadband connection was a privilege back then, and I was lucky enough to have one). Although I never followed the events closely, I remember reading about the update in the newspaper every day. I remember Saina Nehwal won the bronze as her opponent faced an ankle injury during the bronze medal match. I heard people talking about it at least a couple of times in school the next day. I also remember we won medals in wrestling and boxing. I used to tell my brother jokingly; we Indians are only good at sports in which we have to fight each other. I remember seeing a news report about a small country named Granada, whose athlete won a gold medal. London 2012 was a great year as we won 6 medals but not even a single gold.

When Rio 2016 came, I hoped we would win a gold medal. I was in 10th grade, and my memories of that time are still pretty fresh. It was a heartbreaking moment to see the Indian hockey team lose to Germany or Netherlands. I had heard in the news that some Indian shooters have a great chance. However, none of them won a medal. I had seen many different sports like archery, boxing and wrestling throughout the Olympics. I was elated when we finally won a silver medal in wrestling. However, my best memory of Rio 2016 was the final match between PV Sindhu and Carolina Marin. We had our class trip to Silvassa, and in the evening, when others were getting ready for the DJ night, all my friends were jumping, shouting and cheering as Sindhu defended 4 or 5 set points to win the first set. Sindhu eventually lost, but it was such a fantastic match. India just won 2 medals at Rio, too far from that coveted gold medal.

I did not know much about the Olympics till then. In 11th grade, when my teacher tried to motivate the class during one chemistry lecture, he talked about two people, Bob Beamon and Heather Dorniden. Bob Beamon was a long jumper who broke the world record; he shattered it by 40 cm. He jumped so long that referees had to measure his jump differently, as their measuring equipment was insufficient for his jump. Heather Dorniden fell in a 600m race and still won the race. She said after the race that her stumble during the race helped her hit the speed she never had in her life. These were amongst the most inspiring stories I had heard during the gruelling so-called “JEE Preparation Days”.

Then came the Tokyo 2020 Olympics (although it happened in 2021). I learnt a lot about different sports. I knew about half the people in the Indian contingent, and I knew that we had many athletes who could potentially win medals this year. It all started in the best way possible. On the very first day, we won a silver medal in weightlifting. Mirabai Chanu, who could not make a single successful lift, won India its first silver medal. Indians were performing amazingly well. I came to know from my friends’ Instagram stories about the significant achievement of the Indian badminton men’s duo, who defeated one of the leading medal contenders. Then came the news confirming another medal in boxing where Lovlina B. had entered the semi-finals.

The best part of this Olympics was seeing the Indian Hockey teams playing. My brother and I were jumping up like crazy when Sreejesh made that last penalty corner save, and we won the bronze medal. At the same time were in despair when the women’s team lost in the semis after getting an early lead. The turnaround in the men’s wrestling semi-final by Ravi Kumar, where he won after trailing by 9 points, is a story for generations to come. PV Sindhu and B. Punia also won bronze medals. It was all pretty great till the last day. India had already performed excellently at the Olympics. However, it was yet another Olympics when not a single person from 1.5 billion people was good enough to win Olympic gold.

It was the last evening of the Tokyo Olympics. I was taking my evening nap when my brother woke me up. “We nearly have the gold”, he said. Indian Javelin thrower Neeraj Chopra was leading by a considerable margin in the final. “Is it really happening? Will we get gold?“. I was biting my nails as the throwers tried to beat the 87m mark. With every throw, India was inching closer to its first athletics gold in track and field events. I had heard about Milkha Singh and PT Usha, but they never won Olympic gold. I knew this was historical. And a few minutes later we won! Gold to India. All the memories from 13 years ago flashed. I knew why it was such a big deal this time! I later watched the medal ceremony and the Indian national anthem. Goosebumps!

I still think about various things, like why don’t we dominate a sport like other countries. The USA dominates swimming, Japan Judo and China Table Tennis. When will we start dominating any sport? Who will win the next gold medal for India? Can we ever win more than one gold in a single Olympic? Will we be able to repeat this performance in Paris? Only time will tell…