Vinesh Phogat India Arrival Live: Vinesh Phogat returns to India for the first time since Paris Olympics.
Vinesh Phogat India Arrival Live: Wrestler Vinesh Phogat returns to India on Saturday, the first time she will be setting foot on home soil after the Paris Olympics. Phogat had a whirlwind Olympics when she was disqualified from the 50 kg gold medal match in Paris after she was found 100 gms overweight in the official weigh-in on the morning of the bout.
The wrestler had subsequently appealed the decision of the United World Wrestling (UWW) and International Olympic Committee (IOC) at the Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS) for a joint silver medal but on Wednesday, the CAS dismissed her petition.
Phogat, who had retired after her heartbreak in Paris, wrote a 3-page long letter on X on Friday night, keeping the door slightly ajar for a return to wrestling in the future.
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Vinesh Phogat Arrives in India LIVE: Follow live updates from Vinesh Phogat’s arrival in India after 2024 Paris Olympics.
Vinesh Phogat of India reacts after winning the match against Yui Susaki of Japan. (REUTERS)
Thought she might die, says Vinesh Phogat coach on weight-cut before final
Vinesh Phogat’s coach at the Paris Games, Woller Akos, has said he feared that the wrestler “might die” by the end of the five-and-a-half hours of intense weight-cut the night before the Olympic final.
Facing criticism after Vinesh Phogat was disqualified from the 50-kg final for being 100g overweight, the Hungarian, in a social media post on Thursday, said the team did everything possible before the second-day weigh-in so that the wrestler could take the mat for the gold-medal bout.
In a Facebook post in Hungarian, which he later took down, Akos highlighted Vinesh Phogat’s commitment to secure her first Olympic medal. “After the semi-final, 2.7 kg of excess weight was left; we exercised for one hour and twenty minutes, but 1.5 kg still remained. Later, after 50 minutes of sauna, not a drop of sweat appeared on her. There was no choice left, and from midnight to 5:30 in the morning, she worked on different cardio machines and wrestling moves, about three-quarters of an hour at one go, with two-three minutes of rest. Then she started again. She collapsed, but somehow we got her up, and she spent an hour in the sauna. I don’t intentionally write dramatic details, but I only remember thinking that she might die,” Akos wrote. (READ MORE)
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First uploaded on: 17-08-2024 at 07:38 IST
