Life Etc Etc

In my previous blog we arrived at a ratio  (Total no. of medals won at the Asian Games) / (Total no. of medals won at Olympics)   which correlated the performance of the Asian games with the Olympics that occurred in the same four year cycle.  We found out that India's ratio of 17.83  was at the bottom of the list  (remember a lower ratio points to a greater ability to reproduce one's Asian Games performance on the Olympic stage)  when we considered the top ranking nations at Asian Games.  But one question remained unanswered, was this the greatest disparity between Asian Games and Olympics as far as India was concerned? I dove straight into the medal tallies from the previous century to dig up the answer to my question.  The graph brought about several interesting observations: Until 2008 Olympics, India's performance at the 1952 Helsinki games (with 2 medals) was its best ever so was the medal tally at the first ever Asian Games in 1951. Such a...

From the pinnacle of Asian Games, Olympics was a steep fall for India. That set me thinking as to how many more countries found the going tough on the world stage after excelling at the Asian games. For my initial analysis, I took the top 15 countries at Asian Games and mapped out their corresponding ranking at Olympics. As expected, India's Olympic ranking of 71 was third worst behind Malaysia and Qatar. But rankings are not always a great measure to assess how well a country did at a multisport event where a country with a single gold medal outranks another with multiple medals on the account of that country not winning a gold medal. So, in order to have an equitable comparison, I mapped out the number of medals each country won at the Olympics and Asian Games side by side.   This time India narrowly avoided the lower third of the graph which contained countries such as Hong Kong, Indonesia and Bahrain that were placed higher over India in the Olympic rankings. Like rankin...

 As a sports fan, the one thing you would like to absolutely avoid is to see your heroes getting humbled. I went through the misery of Indian team's collapse in the 2023 World Cup final , then watched Rafa getting pulverized at Roland Garros and have now witnessed Daniel Dubois batter Anthony Joshua at Wembley. So here are three disappointing things about the Anthony Joshua knockout: What's most disheartening about this fight is the way it started . AJ never looked like he was in his elements. He was on the backfoot from the get go and once Dubois' punch landed at the end of the first round, he never found his legs in the next few rounds. This was totally unexpected from a thorough professional like Joshua who's known to meticulously prepare for all of his fights If the match began with adversity, things started looking up for AJ by the time the 5th round started. He hurt Dubois with a right and set him up for an uppercut by backing him into the ropes but like a lot ...

When I first started writing this blog more than a decade ago, the reception wasn't exactly great for me to continue sharing my thoughts, opinions or observations . I questioned myself a lot during those times and seriously doubted whether I would ever garner attention for the blog. While self doubt drove me into inaction, the awareness that I was letting myself down urged me to repeatedly mount a comeback and write something after a lull period. These alternate cycles of boom and bust taught me one important thing, that come no matter what the only person I had to impress with this blog was me. Maintaining a certain standard with my blog was the highest priority. As long as I lived up to that ideal everything else that came along with it was just an added incentive. The same, I believe applies to everything you initiate in life. The only person you have to impress with anything in life is just yourself .  Why? What about trying to impress loved ones, family members, friends ...

When Asian Games concluded in October 2023, with the Indian athletics contingent winning a whopping 29 medals , there was hope that in 10 months time we would be putting up our strongest performance ever in Olympics 2024. That, unfortunately remained an unfulfilled dream. Apart from Neeraj Chopra, Avinash Sable and the men's relay team to some extent there was no fight offered by any of our athletes which made them look like serious medal contenders. So, where did it all go wrong? Annu Rani at Paris Olympics <Courtesy: Olympics > I pointed this out in a tweet of mine but I believe a majority of our athletes peaked for the Asian Games with almost everything going downhill from there either due to lack of prep, focus or injuries.  Harmilan Bains, Ancy Sojan Edappilly, Tajinderpal Singh Toor and Kishore Jena all suffered injuries post Asian Games with Harmilan and Ancy missing out on Olympic qualification Jyothi Yarraji was posting a string of sub 13 second times prior to her in...

If winning an Olympic medal is the toughest thing that a sportsperson can achieve in their life then qualifying for the Olympics should be right up there for a country like India which until a decade ago didn't have a proper ecosystem to develop athletes at the grassroot level. It's already been a week since the Olympics has started but before we talk about the Olympians, let's take a look at the heroes who made a place in our heart even after missing out on qualification. Tejas Shirse : If there was an award for the most improved athlete of the year then it must go to Tejas who broke the 100m hurdles national record in his pursuit of Olympic glory. His yearning to excel took him to Europe where he produced a series of podium finishes as he collected ranking points which put him within touching distance of his dream. If only he started his season a bit earlier, we could have seen Tejas' penchant for excellence burn brighter on the Olympics stage but if not this one he...