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Journalism of Courage
A couple of days before the Indian athletics contingent is scheduled to leave for Incheon, Renjith Maheshwary was busy packing his stuff in his hostel room at NIS Patiala. But Maheshwary wasn’t headed to the Asian Games. Instead, on Wednesday night, he was preparing to return home to Chennai.
Once India’s premier triple jumper, the 2010 CWG bronze medallist has had a dismal year so far. He couldn’t qualify for the Glasgow CWG and so far hadn’t come close to meeting the qualifying standard of 16.56m set by the Athletics Federation of India (AFI) for the Asian Games. Having missed the mark at the Federation Cup in Patiala last month, Maheshwary had headed to the IAAF Intercontinental Cup in Morocco last week. There, his best leap was a mere 15.91m – a performance fit for juniors.
For the first couple of his mandatory six jumps Maheshwary seemed racked with self doubt. He leaped from nearly a foot behind the takeoff board and landed in the sub-16m range. On his third jump though, something clicked. Maheshwary found the board and jumped 16.52m. The next one saw him clear 16.61m – a mark that would have placed him fourth on the Asian charts this year. The jump would also fetch Maheshwary the nod from the AFI later in the evening.
What shocked the triple jumper into finding his rhythm wasn’t advice from his coach or a brainwave, but simply resignation. “This entire year I was putting pressure on myself to perform and qualify. This time when my first two jumps failed, I felt I wasn’t going to make it anyway. So I forgot about trying to record a clean jump and simply went for it. Luckily it worked,” Maheshwary says.
Mayookha too makes cut
He wasn’t the only athlete who earned a last-gasp ticket to Incheon. Women’s triple jumper Mayookha Johny also earned a spot on the team roster with a leap of 13.56m, well above the 13.39 qualifying mark. Not making the cut, however, was the men’s 4x400m relay team. The squad comprising Arun KJ, Jibin Sebastian, Kunhu Mohammad and Arokya Rajiv recorded a time of 3.07.05 seconds, which was deemed unsatisfactory.
