Rio 2016 analysis | Why did Indian athletes fare so poorly?

While there have been bouquets all around despite India’s abysmal performance at the Rio Olympics, something seems to have gone horribly wrong with the Indian contingent.

A look at the performances of athletes in events where minimum qualifications were set reveal that 13 out of the 15 were not able to meet the benchmark on the basis of which they qualified in the first place.

In non-athletic category like archery, swimming and weightlifting, too, our sportsmen and women fell way short of their qualifying timings. These revelations raise serious questions as to how Indian Olympic officials selected athletes for Rio and why exactly did the very athletes who surpassed the minimum requirements during the selection stage fell considerably short of them in Rio.

One of the most serious discrepancies relate tomen’s athletics. Three Indian runners - Jinson Johnson, Dharambir Singh and Muhammad Anas Yahiya – made the cut for Rio in 800 metres, 200 metres and 400 metres, respectively. Of the three,Dharambir failed a dope a test and was banned from competing in Rio.

For 800 metres, the minimum qualifying time was 1 minute, 46 seconds. At the qualifying Indian Grand Prix in Bengaluru in July, Jinson won the race, clocking 1:45:98. He outrun his opponents by almost 100 metres towards the end.

At Rio, he finished 25th, failed to qualify for the semis and clocked 1:47:27. In effect, he would not have been able to even qualify for Olympics with this timing. For 400 metres, Muhammad Yahiya qualified in Bengaluru with exactly the minimum qualification time of 45:40 seconds. At Rio, he was ranked 31st with a timing of 45:95 seconds.

In events like 400 metres, where a few milliseconds make all the difference, Yahya, like Jinson, would have never qualified for the Olympics with this timing.

Things were even more bizarre in long jump and triple jump, where India was represented by Ankit Sharma and Renjith Maheshwary, respectively. The minimum qualifying distance for Rio was 8.15 metres. Sharma’s jump of 8.17 metres at the Kosanov Memorial Championship in 2016 in Kazakhstan was enough to get him qualified. However, in Rio, he jumped 7.67 metres, finishing 24th. 

In fact, Sharma had fouled in his first two attempts during the event and was on the verge of being disqualified. Indian triple jumper Renjith Maheshwary also just about managed to qualify for Rio by meeting the benchmark 16.95 metres. However, in Rio, in his three jumps, the highest Maheshwary touched was 16.13 metres. In the other two jumps, he did not even touch the 16-metre mark.

The story was no different in other track-and-field events like shot-put and discus throw as well. While India’s shot-put champion Inderjeet Singh, 28, who was also one of the earliest to qualify for Rio, failed a dope test after throwing the Olympic benchmark of 20.65 metres, discus thrower Vikas Gowda qualified for Rio with a 65-metre throw. But at the games, Gowda threw below 60 metres and finished 28th.

The performance of women, too, were no different.Three runners – Dutee Chand, Srabani Nanda and Nirmala Sheoran – represented India in the 100 metres, 200 metres and 400 metres, respectively. For qualifying for Rio, they needed 11:32 seconds, 23:20 seconds and 52:20 seconds, respectively. While Dutee and Srabani met the benchmarks in Kazakhstan, Nirmala cleared it at the National Athletics Championships in Hyderabad in July.

However at Rio, Dutee, Srabani and Nirmala clocked 11:69 seconds, 23:58 seconds and 53:03 seconds in their respective races. With these timings, none of the three would have qualified for the Olympics.

Outside track and field, serious questions remain on the comparative performances of India’s weightlifters. In the men’s category, Sathish Sivalingam made the cut for the 77-kg category during the selection trials at the National Institute of Sports, Patiala. During the selection, he had bettered his own record, picking 336 kg.

In Rio, he managed 329 kg, finishing 11th out of 14 athletes. In the women’s 48-kg category, Saikhom Mirabai Chanu made the cut during the same trials. She managed 192 kg during the trials. However in Rio, she failed to complete the event. She failed to lift the required weight in both snatch and in clean and jerk.

These figures show that all was not well with Indian athletes at Rio. The same athletes who had surpassed Olympic benchmarks, barely a month before the games, fell way below them during the Games. Indian Olympic Association (IOA) officials said that their representatives were in Rio and would comment later on dna’s disclosures. Sports Authority of India (SAI) officials did not respond to calls and texts till the time of going to press.