In the Indian wrestling sphere dominated by and hailed for freestyle and women’s disciplines, Greco-Roman has carved its own place over a span of six days of the Asian Wrestling Championships in New Delhi last week.
The fact that the Greco-Roman wrestlers added five medals, including Sunil Kumar’s gold, to India’s tally of 20 establishes that the Greco-Romans have emerged in India from the shadow of the much-fancied freestyle and women’s wrestling. The Olympic discipline has risen in style. The nation has got reasons to follow Greco-Roman wrestling. The emergence of icons will start driving the gen-next of Indian wrestling also towards Greco-Roman.
Also Read: Coronavirus Impact: Asian Olympic Wrestling Qualifiers deferred indefinitely
India, the 2020 Asian Championships hosts, had bettered the 2019 performance, winning five medals including one gold by Sunil Kumar. Sunil’s first-place finish was special in more than one ways. The Haryana born wrestler with the gold also ended India’s 27-year-old wait for an international Greco-Roman title. Pappu Yadav was the last Indian Greco-Roman wrestler to win a gold medal in 1993.
Sunil Kumar attributes his success to mental fitness, which plays an important role during big bouts.
“There is no doubt that my hard work paid off but mental conditioning is that aspect of the game which we normally don’t speak about. Much of the credit for the gold goes to that,” the 87kg gold medallist told TOI.
“We normally overlook the aspect of mental fitness, but having a steady and calm head over your shoulders are really important, especially in big-ticket events,” he added.
Sunil had a nerve-wracking semi-final bout against Azamat Kusutbayev. Falling behind in the first quarter 8-1, the Indian grappler covered a lot of ground to win the match 12-8. He talked about his strategy for the semi-finals and said his plan was to tire out his opponent. Sunil says that the man behind the strategy was Dr. Swarup Savanur.
“I had faced Azamat last year too, so I had a fair idea about his game plan. I knew he would come hard at me in the first period but his poor endurance level would be an advantage for me in the next. That’s exactly what happened,” Sunil told TOI. He said that not losing focus was also important for the strategy to work and that is where the mental fitness played its part.
Sunil is now focussing on the Asian Olympic Qualifiers. Although there is no certainty about the qualifiers in the wake of the global Coronavirus threat, Sunil will be traveling to Azerbaijan to train for the competition, which has been deferred yet again.
The qualification tournament was to rescheduled from China to Bishkek, Kyrgyzstan, next month. But it will now also not take place there. Due to the Coronavirus outbreak, the United World Wrestling (UWW) decided to cancel the Bishkek event and there is no confirmation on the next venue and dates. The Asian Olympic Qualifiers are not happening in March. That’s confirmed for now.
