Paris Olympics 2024: Who will join Neeraj Chopra and Kishore Jena in javelin throw event

Finishing sixth in the final of the World Championships might be the kind of debut most athletes might only dream about. However, despite throwing his season’s second best of 84.14m (the best being 84.33m), his performance at Worlds 2023 in Budapest left DP Manu unsatisfied.

During the Asian Games in Hangzhou, the 23-year-old from Karnataka was not part of the Indian contingent. Therefore, from his base at the Army Sports Institute in Pune, he watched history unfold with Olympic and World champion Neeraj Chopra securing yet another gold medal and Kishore Kumar Jena, who had placed fifth at the Worlds, clinching a silver. This marked India’s first ever 1-2 podium finish in javelin at the Asian Games.

Manu says it could have well been a 1-2-3 finish. “I know if I had competed I would also have made the podium. I was throwing well and in really good form. Plus Neeraj  bhaiyya was there and when other Indians throw with him, our level also goes up,” he says. Indeed the bronze medal at Hangzhou was won by Japan’s Genki Dean Thomas, with a throw of 82.44m — a mark Manu had crossed thrice prior to the Asian Games.

Manu couldn’t travel to the Asian Games because of the nature of the qualification system, which mandated that countries send only two representatives for each event. In javelin for India, one of them was always going to be Neeraj. For the second spot, Kishore was selected on the basis of his performance at the Inter State Championships in Bhubaneswar earlier in the year — a competition in which Manu had only finished fourth.

“The only way Manu could have gone to the Asian Games was if either Neeraj or Jena withdrew from the competition. When that didn’t happen, he was of course very disappointed,” recalls coach Kashinath Naik.

Manu soon got over it. “After this, my goal changed. I want to make sure that I get a chance in the Paris Olympics. That’s the target for me now,” he says.

COMPLETING THE TROIKA

Unlike in the Asian Games, India can send three participants to Paris. Throwers can qualify either by meeting the minimum standard — 85.50m — or by ranking among the top 32 throwers in the world at the end of the qualification cycle.

Two Indians have directly qualified for the Paris Games already — Neeraj Chopra did so with his first throw at the World Championships while Kishore followed suit at the Asian Games with his silver medal-winning effort. Ostensibly that leaves just one qualification slot open for an Indian athlete.

The qualification of three javelin throwers for the Olympics would be a landmark moment in Indian athletics. And as we head into the Olympic season, it seems all but certain that this will be the case. “At this stage I think we will see India fill all three possible slots in the javelin throw,” says Adille Sumariwalla, the president of the Athletics Federation of India.

India has a history of filling up all available qualification slots at the Olympics. Sumariwalla says, “We have had multiple instances where we qualified with all available athletes. Even for Paris, we secured three slots in the men’s race walk event. But racewalk isn’t an event where we have achieved a lot of success at the World level. On the other hand, India is one of the strongest nations in men’s javelin throw.”

Even though Manu is currently ranked among the top 32 athletes in the world, there’s no guarantee that he will accompany Neeraj and Kishore to Paris in little over half-a-year. “ Is baar Diwali lagega (It will almost be like Diwali this time). There is a lot of competition and everyone will be working really hard,” he says.

On the face of it, Manu can be considered the favourite to seal the Olympic quota. He has after all the third best throw by an Indian this season. Before Kishore’s impressive breakout in 2023, it was Manu who was considered the next big thing in Indian javelin, having delivered the second-best throw after Neeraj.

That Manu is not able to seal the third spot with ease is testament to the surge in Indian talent in the sport. At the Inter State Championships in Bhubaneswar — the qualification event for the Asian Games — Manu finished fourth, behind eventual champion Rohit Yadav, a 22-year-old who threw 83.28m. Rohit finished ahead of Kishore as well, but the latter only went when Rohit picked up an elbow injury that required surgery.

THE DARKHORSE

Yadav is still rehabilitating from his surgery at Thiruvananthapuram. However, he admits that his recovery is taking longer than expected. While he plans on returning to competition in 2024, he’s uncertain just how quickly he will be able to bounce back. Perhaps the biggest surprise in the Olympic qualification race is likely to come from Shivpal Singh, who was the undisputed No. 2 behind Neeraj Chopra in the Indian pecking order prior to the emergence of Manu, Rohit and Jena in the last couple of years. The 28-year-old had a personal best of 86.23m that’s still the third best ever by an Indian.

But Shivpal started this season under the cloud of a four-year doping ban, uncertain whether he was ever going to be able to compete at any level. In the end, his ban was reduced on appeal, allowing him to return to competition, following which he won gold at the National Games beating Manu in the process.

After a disappointing Olympic campaign in Tokyo — where he finished 12 ^th in his group during qualifying — all hopes of a comeback seemed to disappear after he was tested positive for a banned substance late in 2021.

“That ban was the toughest time for me. I was shocked how it happened. It changed the way people saw me. They would talk behind my back; I would find that out later. I fell into depression. I avoided meeting people. And no one wants to be around you at that time,” Shivpal recalls. He would fight the case and eventually prove that his positive result was caused by a tainted supplement. Although his suspension would be reduced to one year on appeal, it was only in 2023 that he would get the all-clear to return to competition.

While he had hoped to qualify for the Asian Games, Shivpal said the long layoff did take its toll. “Honestly, I didn’t want to have anything much to do with sport for a long time. And when you take a long break from the sport, it has an effect on your body. I was in the best shape of my career at the Olympics; I was around 91kg then. By the time I returned to training, after I knew that the doping ban was removed, I was 105kg. When I started to train again, I couldn’t even run 400m on the track without catching my breath,” he says.

Shivpal is realistic about his physical condition at the end of the 2023 season. “I was at my peak in 2021 before the Olympics. Right now I would say that I’m at about 60 percent of where I was. I’m still about 95kg. I still have some time to get back to my peak,” he says.

Despite this, he isn’t short of self belief. An unexpected bonus of his long layoff was the fact that his chronic back and shoulder injuries got the time to heal. Upon his return, he found himself throwing over 80 meters with ease. Him consistently throwing above 80m despite being far from his personal best indicates that he is capable of much bigger throws. This is evident from his 81.96m at Bhubaneswar and 81.11m gold-winning effort at the National Games in Goa.

“I was really unfit before I returned to competition in Bhubaneswar. In fact, just before the National Games, I hadn’t even been training for a month because I was posted at Naliya Air Force Base (near the border with Pakistan in Gujarat’s Sir Creek area). There isn’t any training facility there apart from a general purpose gym. I just did basic training and came to Goa. Very honestly, if you give me enough warm-up time, I’ll always be confident of at least making an 80m throw,” he says.

Shivpal isn’t even particularly concerned about the 85.50m qualification standard. “I’ve achieved that mark before so it’s not something that I think will be hard to get. Even now it’s just a matter of finding the right angle of release. I know that if I stay injury-free until the start of next season, I’ll get it very quickly,” he says.

If Shivpal isn’t sweating about qualifying for the Olympics, Manu isn’t either. Although he’s fairly likely to qualify through the ranking system and is almost certain to rank higher than Shivpal because of his performance at the 2023 Worlds and Asian Championships, Manu believes he can qualify directly. “I am not merely thinking of just qualifying for the Olympics. I am thinking about how I can make a big throw — something close to 90m at the Olympics,” he says.

“I actually thought I had a good season last year. Although, I had a better season’s best in 2022 (84.35m), I was lot more consistent in 2023 (he crossed 80m in all but one competition). I actually thought I would qualify for the Olympics in 2023 itself. I had three competitions where I was feeling good and was throwing well — Indian Grand Prix (84.33m), World Championships (84.11) and Open Athletics Championships (82.06m) — but I made some basic errors in each of them. I got my best throw in these competitions from a release that was around 2 meters short of the foul line. It’s a small technical error that I’ve been working on,” says Manu.

“Compared to last year I’m a lot stronger. I still have a slightly bent knee that I’m trying to correct but other than that I feel I’m getting a lot of power behind my throws. I’ve crossed 85m twice in training and am regularly in the 83m-84m range. So I know it’s not going to be very difficult to make that throw in competition also.”

If both Manu and Shivpal say they aren’t looking at just touching the 85.50m magic mark, it’s because neither thinks that just getting it would be enough to secure the Olympic berth. AFI president Sumariwalla has said as much. “It would be unfair to say what the selection criteria will be if multiple athletes secure the Olympic qualification standard because that’s not happened just yet. But I can see it is going to be a bit of a challenging situation. With the exception of Neeraj I don’t think we can say anyone is going to be guaranteed a spot. I think a lot will come down to current form as well,” he says.

Manu agrees with that assessment. “I know I can’t depend on just getting 85.50m and thinking that it will take me to the Olympics. There’s no guarantee of that. I don’t think qualification will come on the basis of ranking. And I also don’t think there’s any guarantee that just because someone does 85.50m, they will be going to the Olympics. I know Shivpal  bhai is also very strong and capable of getting to 85.50m. Rohit is also coming back from injury, but he’s also a very good thrower. All of us will have to try and throw as much above 85.50m as possible,” he says.

That being said, both Manu and Shivpal are counting down to the first competition of the season. “The first competition of the season is the Indian Grand Prix on March 22. I think it will be important to hit the qualifying standard as early as possible because it will be a good confidence boost.

“After that we can prepare to increase that mark,” says Shivpal. “The goal for any athlete isn’t just to qualify for the Olympics. It’s to prepare ourselves in such a way that we can make a big throw in Paris,” he says.