CWG: Records and medals don't always go hand in hand

Athletics : Road To The Asian Games

Medals and Performances do not necessarily go hand in hand , especially in Athletics . Record breaking performances might not yield a medal whereas a decent performance which is just above the remainder of the field can earn you a bronze or even a silver . Lets keep the Gold aside, as its always special to be the best from the rest !

Some Really Good Performances…

Athletics – Medals and Performances

The recently concluded CWG witnessed some National Records being broken and equalized. Mohammed Qureshi managed to meet the 10.30sec mark in the 100m sprint . Whereas Prajusha Malliakal’s 13.72m Triple Jump bettered the National Mark set in Patiala earlier this year. Both Records did not earn Medals for India ! But Renjith Maheswari cleared the 17m barrier in the Triple Jump earning a bronze as well as setting the National Record. The Men’s 4X100m Relay team re-wrote the Record Books twice in two days as they settled for a bronze by lowering the 39sec mark.

Unnoticed performances of the CWG worth mentioning in Women’s category include Geetha Satti’s 200m sprint which was below 24sec , the 13.83sec in 100m hurdles by Gayathri Govindaraj and Sahanakumari’s 1.83m High Jump . The Men’s category include long distance runner Suresh Kumar registering 29.49.74mns which is pretty close to the India’s best but far off from Asian standards. Hari Sankar Roy and Ankit Sharma in High and Long Jump’s were similarly close to the National Marks with performances of 2.15m and 7.56m respectively but again are not close to Asian Marks.

Lows and Highs …

Tintu Luka in 800m , Siddharth Thingalaya in 110m Hurdles and the duo of Om Prakash and Saurabh Vij in Shot Put were the huge disappointments in CWG. Their Season bests were far more better than what they managed in October. Asian Games is an opportunity for them to showcase their real ability. A Medal from Tintu and Om Prakash for sure.

Krishna Poonia

The Highs in Women’s category include medal winners Kavita Raut in 10km , Long Jumper Prajusha, Discuss Throwers Krishna Poonia , Harwant Kaur and Seema Antil , the 4×100 and 4×400 Relay Teams which boast of Geetha , Srabani Nanda , PK Priya , Jyoti , Manjeeth , Sini Jose , Ashwini , Mandeep , Jauna and Chitra Soman.

The Highs in Men’s category include usual suspect Vikas Gowda in Discuss along with surprise winners Kashinath Naik in Javelin and Renjith in Triple Jump. The 20km walk podium finish by Harminder Singh and the 4x100m Medal Winning Relay team of Rahamatulla Molla , Suresh , Manzile and Sameer Nassema.

The Numbers Game : A Look At Track and Field , Throw and Jump…

The Patiala National Championships and the Common Wealth Games were held prior to the Asian Games in November. These two tournaments give us a decent picture of where we stand with respect to recent performances upto the Asian Games.

Women’s

The Numbers Game : Women's

Men’s

The Numbers Game : Men's

National Records , Championships and Games…

Athletics : Road To The Asian Games

Our National Records in 15 Men’s and 13 Women’s events are better than Asian Games ’06 bronze winning performances ! This means that a National Record breaking performance could earn us medals in around 28 events out of 40 in the Asian Games . But a look at similar analogy with the CWG ’10 Bronze Mark shows the real picture. 12 in Men’s and 14 in the Women’s Category should have earned us medals had the NR’s been met but we have managed medals in only 10 events overall !

So bettering a National Record looks like the key here but its not always necessary. Championships like the Worlds or even the Nationals are where performances count more than Medals. Whereas Games – Asian and Commonwealth are more about Medals than Records. A Record along with a Medal is an icing on the cake !