Neeraj has been exceptional in his sport. This year alone he had claimed three gold medals (Commonwealth Games, Sotteville Athletics Meet, Savo Games) before going to Jakarta. Now, a fourth yellow metal has come his way. This is the biggest achievement in his career
Jakarta: India’s talented youngster Neeraj Chopra shattered the national record in javelin throw to win gold at the Asian Games here at GBK Stadium on Monday.
The 20-year-old Haryana boy did the nation proud as he hurled the javelin to a distance of 88.06 metres, a new national mark, bettering his own record of 87.43m. He is the first Indian to win javelin gold in Asian Games history. Overall this is the third javelin medal for the country. Parsa Singh (silver) in 1951 and Gurtej Singh (bronze) in 1982 were the previous Indian winners.
Neeraj has been exceptional in his sport. This year alone he had claimed three gold medals (Commonwealth Games, Sotteville Athletics Meet, Savo Games) before going to Jakarta. Now, a fourth yellow metal has come his way. This is the biggest achievement in his career at the senior level. In 2016, he had won gold at World U-20 Championships.
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India take a bow! 🙏 brings home Gold No. 8 for and the 2nd for ! Clearing a distance of 88.06m, Neeraj Chopra is unstoppable in breaking all Records loose. 👏🇮🇳 pic.twitter.com/9EwJmWFpLj
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He started off with a throw of 83.46m. The next one was a foul. He came back stronger with a record effort of 88.06m which was enough to win gold. The next two attempts saw him registering 83.25m and 86.36m. His final throw ended in a foul. In the 13-man field, barring Neeraj, nobody could breach the 85m mark.
China's Qizhen Liu (82.22m) and Pakistan's Arshad Nadeem (80.75m) took silver and bronze respectively.
Earlier this year, he won gold (86.47m) at the Commonwealth Games in April in Australia. In May, at the Diamond League in Doha, he set a new national mark with 87.43m. However, he failed to finish on the podium as he came fourth.
"The Asian Games will have tougher competition than CWG (Commonwealth Games). There will be some good javelin throwers. Last year itself, a guy from Chinese Taipei threw 91m. Besides him, there will be good throwers from Qatar, Japan and China. So, the Asian Games will have stiff competition, but I will give it my all to do well there," Neeraj said in May.
He had also stated that the pressure of Asian Games would work in his favour. "Even if there is pressure on me, it usually works in my favour," the youngster said.
In the opening ceremony of the current Asian Games, Neeraj was India’s flag bearer.
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