Paris Olympics: Mirabai Chanu eyeing historic second medal in another lone ranger effort

One of the four individual Indian athletes hoping for a repeat of their success from the Tokyo Olympics and win back-to-back medals, weightlifter Saikhom Mirabai Chanu is the lone weightlifter representing the country in the Paris Olympic Games.

Being the only one from India in her sport in Paris, Mirabai will be carrying the weight of the expectations of 130-odd crore people. But lifting weights comes easy for the 29-year-old from Nongpok Kakching in Imphal East district of Manipur.

Being a lone ranger for the country in top competitions is also not new for Mirabai as she was also the only Indian weightlifter in Tokyo.

Mirabai made history in the re-scheduled Tokyo 2020 Olympic Games in 2021 when she won the silver medal in the 49 kg weight class, becoming the second Indian weightlifter to win an Olympic medal. She is also the most successful Indian lifter at the Olympics and the second one after Karnam Malleswari in 2000 to win an Olympic medal.

Now Miramai, who will be competing in the third Olympics after the 2016 Rio Olympics and 2020 Tokyo, will be hoping to become the second Indian woman sportsperson to win back-to-back medals in the quadrennial Games after shuttler PV Sindhu (2016, 2020).

However, the path to the podium in the women's 49kg class is extremely tough, and Mirabai, who became the World Champion in his weight class in 2017, the first Indian to win.

China's Hou Zhihui, the gold medallist at Tokyo, is the run-away leader with a total lift of 200kg while the rest of the field has recently lifted in the range of 180 to 190kg. However, Hou did not have a smooth qualifying route for Paris, grabbing the quota place in the last minute, overtaking her teammate Jiang Huihua with her final lift at the 2024 IWF World Cup held in Phuket, Thailand, which was the last qualifying event for the Olympics.

Hou, who set a world record in the snatch category at Phuket by lifting 97 kg, is ranked well clear of three of her top contenders – Mirabai, Surodchana Khambao from Thailand, and Jourdan Delacruz from the United States.

Mirabai's strong point is clean and jerk, in which she held the World Record at 119 kg. Thus she will have to do a very good snatch to then capitalise on her performance in clean and jerk to get into medal contention. She has a personal best of 203 kg ((88 kg in Snatch and 115 kg in Clean & Jerk) which she lifted in the 2020 Senior National Weightlifting Championships. She improved her performance in clean and jerk to lift 119 kg in the 2020 Asian Weightlifting Championship in Tashkent, where she achieved a total of 205kg.

It will also be tough for Mirabai in Paris on another count -- injuries. Since winning the silver medal in Tokyo, Mirabai has struggled with injuries -- the hip injury she suffered at the Hangzhou Asian Games in 2023 being the latest setback for her. That injury suffered in October 2023 had kept Mirabai out for five months.

Though Mirabai, who won gold medals in back-to-back Commonwealth Games in 2018 and 2022, has recovered from that injury. She has participated in only one event this season, the IWF World Cup in Phuket, where she finished 12th with a combined lift of 184 kilos.

While that was enough to secure her a ticket to Paris, the competition in the French capital when the weightlifting competitions start on August 7 will be a different matter altogether for the Indian lifter, who won gold in the 2017 World Championship and silver in 2022 in Bogota and has been conferred with the Khel Ratna Award and the Padma Shri in 2018.

Mirabai is currently preparing for the Paris Olympics at the prestigious La Ferte-Milon in France under her American physio Dr Aron Horschig, whose services in preparation for the upcoming Olympic Games, have been covered under TOPS funding.

While Dr. Horschig is trying to keep Mirabai fighting fit for the Olympics, it is chief national coach Vijay Sharma who is in France with the Manipuri lifter and will be planning her campaign to win a medal in the second successive Olympic Games.