Vinesh Phogat announces retirement: ‘Wrestling beat me’
“Mother, wrestling beat me, I lost. Your dream and my courage are all broken. I don’t have any more strength now. Goodbye Wrestling 2001-2024. I will forever be in your debt,” India’s star wrestler Vinesh Phogat wrote on X on Thursday morning.
This comes after her heartbreaking disqualification ahead of the Paris Olympics wrestling final.
The 29-year-old was on the cusp of history after becoming the first Indian woman to qualify for an Olympic wrestling final. However, she failed to make weight, missing the cut by 100 grams during the weigh-in on Wednesday morning, leading to her disqualification from the 50kg category event.
Vinesh Phogat, who usually competes in the 53kg category, had dropped down to 50kg for the Olympics. She faced a similar challenge during the Olympic qualifiers, where she narrowly made the cut. Despite the rigorous attempts to shed the excess weight—jogging, skipping, and cycling throughout the night—Phogat couldn’t meet the requirement.
Phogat’s journey to the final had been remarkable. On Tuesday, she defeated World No.1 and Tokyo 2020 champion Yui Susaki of Japan, followed by victories over Ukraine’s Oksana Livach and Cuba’s Yusneylis Guzman Lopez, securing her place in the final and making history as the first Indian woman wrestler to reach an Olympic final.
However, Phogat’s victory lap was cut short by the weigh-in disqualification. Sources mentioned that the Indian delegation pleaded for more time to allow her to shed the last few grams, but their request was denied.
This disqualification marks another challenging moment in Phogat’s career. In 2023, she led historic protests against the Wrestling Federation of India’s chief and then BJP MP Brij Bhushan Singh for alleged sexual harassment against women wrestlers, faced police beatings, detention, and endured a hate and bullying campaign by the supporters of ruling Hindu nationalist party. Despite these attacks, she remained undeterred, leveraging her struggles to fuel her determination.
Phogat’s achievement of reaching the final was particularly significant as it followed a year marked by protests and a knee injury that ruled her out of the Asian Games 2023. She had also switched weight categories from 53kg to 50kg specifically for the Olympics, making her journey to the final even more commendable.
