Like a bunch of horticulturists, three men bend forward, squint and pore over a damaged patch of grass.
After a minute of careful analysis, one of them looks unhappy and leads the other two to a different hole a few yards away, and the sequence repeats.
It’s the final night of track and field at the Asian Games. The Hangzhou Olympic Stadium is packed to its capacity. And under the big bright lights, in the middle of the sprawling field, three puzzled technical officials are trying to find the spot where Neeraj Chopra’s javelin landed.
Clueless, they turn to the technical officials’ desk for assistance. But there isn’t any help forthcoming. All they see from a distance, like the tens of thousands in the stands, is an agitated Chopra wildly gesticulating at the bench and the officials seated there blankly staring back.
A few days ago, in the final of the 25m women’s pistol event, there was a ‘missing shot’. On Wednesday, the javelin final turned into the tale of a missing throw.
Chopra won, as he more often than not does, with a throw of 88.88m to lead a gold-silver finish for India with Kishore Jena marking his personal best of 87.54m, which also sealed his Olympic qualification.
Before their fanfare, though, was the farce.
Indian athletes Neeraj Chopra and Kishore Kumar Jena celebrate after securing gold and silver medal respectively in the Men’s Javelin Throw Final event at the 19th Asian Games, in Hangzhou, China, Wednesday, Oct. 4, 2023. (PTI Photo)
The competition began with the most familiar sights of them all: Neeraj galloping down the runway, launching the spear high into the night sky, falling on his fours followed by a roar – the sign that he was happy with the throw.
It travelled a long distance and fell way beyond the 85m mark; to the naked eye, it looked closer in fact to 88m. “It looked good,” Neeraj said later.
But it will never be known how far the throw went. Because the most unfamiliar scenes followed.
The officials, it turned out, could not measure the throw. A machine is normally used to calculate the distance. “Apparently, the next athlete threw before they could even measure my throw,” Neeraj said. The officials tried doing it manually. “But they lost my mark,” Neeraj added.
Dr. Karlos Bartonietz said he’d seen officials at a competition in Portugal before the Tokyo Olympics record wrong measurements. But nothing like this.
For close to 15 minutes, Neeraj haggled with the officials. “Ultimately, they asked me to retake the throw. I accepted their offer because other athletes were waiting. Their bodies were cooling down because of the incident and I was telling those athletes sorry again and again as they had to wait because of me,” Neeraj said.
And so he went again, amidst allegations and conspiracy theories that travelled faster and farther than the actual throws.
But the absurdity wouldn’t end there.
India’s Neeraj Chopra competes in the Men’s Javelin Throw Final event at the 19th Asian Games, in Hangzhou, China, Wednesday, Oct. 4, 2023. (PTI Photo)
A few minutes later, a furious Neeraj was back at the officials’ desk – this time fighting for his teammate Jena.
The officials red-flagged the Odisha thrower’s second attempt for overstepping the board. But Neeraj’s hawkish eyes had noticed that Jena was well within the mark and so, he protested. Jena, too, joined in and after the officials reviewed the throw, they were forced to reverse their decision.
The official incompetence overshadowed the brilliance of the Indian throwers, who made the Asian Games final a friendly battle among themselves, floating in a different orbit compared to the rest of the field.
The next best thrower, bronze medallist from Japan Genki Dean, was a little more than 6m behind Neeraj and 5 short of Jena.
Jena was almost apologetic about throwing down the gauntlet. “I must say that I idolise Neeraj,” he said. Neeraj was grateful to his teammate. “Thank you, Kishore Jena. You pushed me to do well. Aaj maza aa gaya.”
Jena, who finished in the top five of the World Championships in August, set the competition on fire with his third attempt, which travelled a distance of 86.77m – his personal best and almost two metres ahead of Neeraj’s best attempt until that point.
The Olympic and World Champion, who admitted to getting affected by the earlier distractions, had to respond to defend his Asian Games title. And immediately, he did.
A sweeping wave echoed inside the stadium as, on his fourth attempt, Neeraj’s javelin flew half-way across the ground for a mammoth throw of 88.88m. “I was happy for Kishore but there’s this competitive spirit within me and I had to come up with a bigger throw,” Neeraj said.
He reclaimed the first position and it was now Jena’s turn to respond. And he did so with utmost grace. Jena casually strolled down the runway before unleashing another gigantic throw that fell at a distance of 87.54m. In consecutive throws, he’d broken his own personal best but the second one wasn’t enough to topple Neeraj from the perch.
Jena’s silver will shine as brightly as Chopra’s gold following an evening when the only thing that could stop the Indian duo is not measuring their scores. And even that couldn’t. “We fought, showed how hard we have worked and won medals,” Neeraj said.
Indian athletes Neeraj Chopra and Kishore Kumar Jena celebrate after securing gold and silver medal respectively in the Men’s Javelin Throw Final event at the 19th Asian Games, in Hangzhou, China, Wednesday, Oct. 4, 2023. (PTI Photo)
India’s Neeraj Chopra competes in the Men’s Javelin Throw Final event at the 19th Asian Games, in Hangzhou, China, Wednesday, Oct. 4, 2023. (PTI Photo)
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