The weightlifting events kick off on Saturday, headlined once again by the 27-year-old from Manipur who got India off the blocks with a shining silver on the opening day of the Tokyo Olympics last year.
Tucked in one corner of the NEC Hall 1, some Indian weightlifters are having a ball after their training and recovery session on Friday. Jeremy Lalrinnunga is humming Hindi songs, Achinta Sheuli and Vikas Thakur are chatting away, Gurdeep Singh is joking about the social media usage of Jeremy and Thakur. There are frequent rounds of laughter breaking out of the little Indian huddle.
Mirabai Chanu
Birmingham has been a familiar setting for the country’s weightlifting contingent for the 2022 Commonwealth Games (CWG). They’ve been training here for a month, acclimatizing and revving up their final phase of preparations while, as Gurdeep puts it, doing pretty much everything together. “Be it breakfast, lunch or dinner, we would all eat and chill together,” the Punjab weightlifter said.
Now for some heavy-lifting together to get India’s medal march going at the 2022 Birmingham CWG.
The weightlifting events kick off on Saturday, headlined once again by Mirabai Chanu who got India off the blocks with a shining silver on the opening day of the Tokyo Olympics last year, lifting not just 202kgs but the collective mood of a nation still reeling under the effects of the pandemic.
The scenario and the stakes aren’t quite the same at this CWG. The 2018 gold medallist Mirabai (women’s 49kg) will line up as the last of the three Indians in fray for weightlifting medals on Saturday, with Sanket Mahadev (men’s 55kg) and Gururaja (men’s 61kg) going first up in the day.
India have been the traditional powerhouses in weightlifting at the CWG with more than a ton of medals to flaunt. Four years ago in Gold Coast, the country’s weightlifters swept nine medals, five of them being gold including Mirabai in the 48kg. For a lot of them, therefore, it will be about setting and living up to their own benchmarks in Birmingham.
“Hamari fight kisi bande se nahi hoti, hamrai fight hoti hai lohe se (our fight is not against an opponent, but against the weights),” Gurdeep, seeking to leave a mark in the +109kg category later in the week, said.
That especially holds true for Mirabai. The Manipuri weightlifter is in a league of her own at the CWG level, competing with her inner quest of pushing the boundaries. Mirabai's entry total for Saturday has been listed at 205kg, which was her personal best at the Asian Championships last year (86kg snatch + 119kg clean and jerk, a world record). Among the nearest rivals from the 10 others in her 49kg category is Nigeria's Stella Kingsley who lifted a personal best of 168kg last year.
Mirabai's 2018 gold-winning effort was 196kg (86 + 110), a Games record in the 48kg in which she also has silver from the 2014 edition. “Even with the best of preparations, anything can happen. But I am confident of doing well at the CWG, and of also keeping the record,” Mirabai told this paper last month.
Much like her other celebrated Olympic medallists, the 27-year-old weightlifter has gone a bit quiet post her Tokyo thud. Mirabai has competed in just one tournament since the Games last August, at the Singapore International in February where she won the 55kg category lifting 191kg. After that, she parked herself in St. Louis, USA with her long-time strength and conditioning coach Dr. Aaron Horschig, infusing more power to both sides of her shoulder, which is often in the spotlight.
Mirabai hopes the time spent working on improving her physical attributes and the finer aspects of her technique in snatch would help her elevate the weaker facet. Her best in snatch has been 87kg, and she wants to use the CWG stage to go beyond that. “I feel like I’m getting very close to the 90kg mark. My big objective in this CWG will be to try and cross that 90kg mark,” she had said.
A lot has changed in the Mirabai and Indian weightlifting sphere post last year’s Olympics, and the lesser accomplished challengers from the country are all too upbeat about the Tokyo medallist showing them the way again in Birmingham. “We all look up to her now, and have frankly run out of words to describe her,” Gurdeep said.
While the Saturday show will be all about Mirabai, there will be other Indian weightlifters staring their personal best threshold in the eye over the next few days. Among the prominent few are Jeremy, Achinta, Bindyarani Devi and Popy Hazarika. They’re all relaxed, feeling well prepared and oozing self-belief.
“India toh badhiya karega hi (India will certainly do well),” the soft-spoken Achinta said on Friday. “Our objective is to try and win more medals from the last time.”
Jeremy, the 19-year-old watch-out-for kid on the block, is eager to add a major multi-nation event medal to his young CV that would sit nicely alongside his Youth Olympics gold. “The target is to give my best,” the weightlifter from Aizawl said, giving his music and earphones a pause. “If I manage to do that here, kuch na kuch mil hi jayenge mujhe (I will return with something to show).”
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