E-Paper
Karnam Malleshwari: Doing magic with weights
In Sydney she did what was expected of her in the 69 kg category. Watch out for Malleshwari in the 63 kg category in Athens.
Karnam Malleshwari walked into the Indian Hall of Fame when she became the country's first woman medallist at the Olympic Games.
A weightlifter of rare quality, this strong athlete from Andhra Pradesh had her finest moments at the 2000 Sydney Olympics where she won the bronze medal in the 69 kg weight category. Her total of 240 kg was the result of a snatch effort of 110 kg and resistance of 130 kg in the clean and jerk.
Not many are aware that Malleshwari had been advised to move up from the 63 kg class to the 69 kg class mainly because of a possible chance of a medal in this weight category.
It was, thus, her first competition in the weight category and what is more, in winning the bronze medal, had lived up to the expectations of Balbir Singh, a former national champion and then a member of the ad-hoc committee looking after weightlifting affairs. At a press meeting before the departure of the Sydney-bound squad, Balbir had predicted the exact total Malleshwari would lift for the medal.
Malleshwari's performance at one stroke wiped out the bitter memories of the pre-selection drama where, at one stage, there was even a hint of her not making the trip. But she defied the carping critics, moved to a higher weight category and performed exactly what was expected of her.
Malleshwari's bronze medal weighed that much heavier since it was the only return obtained by India at the Games.
It must be mentioned here that women's weightlifting became competition event only from the Sydney Olympics. It had, however, become a part of the Asian Games from the 1990 edition.
Malleshwari had made her debut in Hiroshima, where she won a bronze and improved upon it with a silver at the Bangkok Games of 1998.
After the triumph at Sydney, Malleshwari has not competed in many major internationals.
As is normal with weightlifters, she has had to constantly vary her bodyweight and in the only two competitions post-Sydney, she participated in two different weight categories.
The first was the Commonwealth Championships in Tonga in May last year. She competed in the 69 kg class and won the gold with a total lift of 235 kg. The other international, the World Championships, was in Vancouver in November 2003. Since she was bordering around 69 kg plus in her bodyweight, she was fattened with extra intake of food and participated in the 75 kg class. It was not a very good outing and Malleshwari finished 11th.
Her coach from Belarus, Leonid Taranenko, who has again taken over the training of Indian weightlifters from January, has advised changes in her weight category.
He does not see much chance for Malleshwari in the 69 kg class and has thus made her shed weight to participate in the 63 kg class at Athens.
Thus, she debuted in a new class at Sydney and would be doing so again four years later.
She is expected to total about 250 kg, which gives her an outside chance of a medal.
