Mumbai: Ten days after coming back from an Olympics that had extra moments of heartbreak for her, Deepika Kumari swung again into coaching — an anomaly to prolonged breaks that almost all athletes grant themselves on the finish of an Olympic cycle.
Deepika Kumari received silver on the World Cup Last in Mexico. (REUTERS)
Why didn’t she? “Honestly, when you win a medal, you can think about taking a break,” Deepika stated. “When you don’t win a medal, when you feel like you’ve done nothing, when you’re not satisfied, break leke kaise sukoon mil sakta hai (what’s the point of taking a break)?”
Deepika did win a medal, in any case. Not the one she desperately seeks, however one which she hadn’t obtained her arms on for six years. Deepika received silver on the World Cup Last in Mexico on Sunday, her first medal since 2018 within the event that pits the season’s greatest performing archers. Six medals (5 silver, one bronze) from 9 World Cup Last appearances is a flaunt-worthy CV, but it has one factor lacking: gold.
“To be a medallist among the world’s top archers feels good,” stated Deepika, who misplaced to China’s Li Jiaman within the last. “But I was disappointed at not winning gold. I still haven’t figured out how I can win the final of this event. It can get frustrating. But I hope the gold will come one day.”
It’s, primarily, the story of Deepika’s profession. India’s most adorned archer has a wealthy unfold of medals throughout tournaments, but in addition one gaping gap. The 2024 Olympics too wouldn’t fill it, with Deepika crashing out within the particular person quarter-final after the workforce exited on the identical stage as a well-recognized gloom engulfed her. Two months on she is smiling once more, swirling on this virtually paradoxical zone of grabbing extra medals whereas nonetheless craving the one she is after.
“For me, it’s important to keep winning medals. Otherwise, mujhte lagta hai mein zinda nahi hu (I don’t feel alive). It also keeps alive the hunger, that greed — that I still don’t have something for which I have been working all these years,” Deepika stated. “Things do get frustrating, when you come close to your target but come out having nothing. You feel like you have wasted your life.”
The 30-year-old felt a shadow of herself for 2 years whereas she was out of the nationwide workforce, a interval the place she additionally turned a mom. Paris was subsequently a distant dream, till it obtained all too actual earlier this yr. Reclaiming her spot within the Indian workforce, Deepika was immediately again within the thick of issues — competing in worldwide occasions (and profitable medals), jostling to qualify for Paris (and getting there).
“Suddenly, I was back in the team, and in an Olympic year. It was less time, and a lot of pressure. I remember in my first tournament back, mein bahut ghabra gayi thi. I had never felt that way before,” Deepika stated. “That was a new experience for me, and a big question mark.”
Deepika went into the Paris Video games in kind and “mentally prepared”, even when not bodily. What went mistaken, then?
“That one shot,” she stated. Main 4-2 in her quarter-final towards Korea’s Nam Suhyeon, Deepika shot a 7 between two 10s within the fourth set. “That one shot pulled me down. Wohi dubaya hai iss Olympics mein.”
A youthful Deepika, she stated, wouldn’t harp an excessive amount of on it. “But as we grow older,” she added, “you tend to overthink. That has been happening to me for the last two years. I wanted to see myself back in best shape, and I started thinking way too much about that. I don’t know why that was… because of pressure or what… and not from the outside, but from within.”
From the skin, social media was relentless in dragging Deepika down for one more Olympics setback (she was again as much as being applauded for the World Cup Last silver). It’s each good and dangerous, Deepika reckons, that she doesn’t see numerous social media. “I’d heard, right after our team matches, that I received a lot of criticism,” Deepika stated. “Look, it’s part of life. If you do well, people will like you. If you don’t, people will forget everything.”
Deepika doesn’t wish to overlook the one medal she remains to be chasing. Not at 30, as a mom who has “hardly spent 3-4 months” together with her daughter since she was born in December 2022. However 4 failed returns, she stays motivated to take a position one other 4 years into it.
“At one point I told myself, ‘mein thak gayi hu haar haar ke. Next time abhi gold hi jeetna hai yaha se (I’m tired of just losing here, I want to take the gold next time)’,” Deepika stated.
“I want to hold medals from every competition. I can’t live with the fact that I don’t have in one. Forget people, I don’t want to tell myself that ‘Deepika, you don’t have a medal from this competition’. I don’t just want to be an Olympian. I want to be an Olympic medallist.”