Vinesh Phogat’s coaches and support team made intense efforts to ensure she met the 50kg weight limit before the official weigh-in for her historic gold medal match against the USA’s Sarah Hildebrandt at the 2024 Paris Olympics.
Despite their efforts, Vinesh was disqualified just hours before the match for failing to meet the weight requirement. This disqualification came as a major blow, especially since Vinesh had made history by becoming the first Indian female wrestler to qualify for an Olympic final.
She was reportedly 100 grams over the permissible 50kg limit, leading to her disqualification from the entire competition. Consequently, her victories from Tuesday were rendered null and void, and she was left without a rank.
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“Vinesh had been competing in the 53kg till February”
India’s Chief Medical Officer Dr. Dinshaw Paudiwala explained what happened revealing, “Vinesh had been competing in the 53kg till February. After that she started competing in 50kg as another athlete (Antim Panghal) had already earned the Olympic quota in that category. As you know only one wrestler from a country is permitted to compete in one category.’
He continued, “Vinesh had two options – either to lower her weight division or increase it. Increase her weight category would mean that she could be competing against stronger athletes. Generally, reducing weight takes a lot of effort as Vinesh’s natural weight is not 50kg.”
Paudiwala added, “Wrestlers usually participate in a weight category less than their natural weight. It gives them an advantage since they are fighting with less stronger opponents. The process of weight cut prior to the weigh-in in the morning involves a calculated restriction of food and water. Besides this, the athlete needs to sweat and that sweating is done with sauna and with exercise. Now this weight cut has the benefit of putting you into a lighter weight but does cause weakness and energy depletion, and this is counterproductive to participation.”
He further shared, “So most wrestlers will thereafter go in for some amount of energy restoration with limited water and high energy foods. These are usually given after the way in the calculation from the nutritionist, which is done is Athlete specific and Vinesh’s nutritionist felt that the usual amount that she takes is about 1.5 kilograms totally over the day, which gives enough energy for the bouts”.
Pardiwala then went on to describe what happened after Tuesday’s bouts.
#WATCH | Paris: Dr Dinshaw Pardiwala, Chief Medical Officer of the Indian Contingent speaks on Vinesh Phogat’s disqualification
He says, “…Her post-participation weight at the end of the semi-finals in the evening was found to be 2.7 kg more than the allowed weight. The team… pic.twitter.com/bG3CBNV2bg
— ANI (@ANI) August 7, 2024
What Was Vinesh Phogat’s post-participation weight?
Dr. Dinshaw Paudiwala revealed, “Her post-participation weight at the end of the semi-finals in the evening was found to be 2.7 kg more than the allowed weight. The team and the coach started off their usual process, which is of course limitation of water, no food.”
He added, “And you started with the whole process of sweating it out. Typically, you require some amount of time for that. But unfortunately, we didn’t have too much time. We had just 12 hours. So the whole night, the entire team, went ahead with this whole process of trying to reduce her weight, putting her in a steam and sauna, making her exercise and whatever was medically possible.”
Paudiwala also shared, “We tried our best to try and get that weight down. When she couldn’t sweat anymore, we even had to go to some drastic measures like cutting off her hair, shortening clothes.”
He added, “If we maybe had a few hours more we could have achieved that 100 grams, but we just didn’t have that time. Now, once she was disqualified, then the question was as a precautionary measure we do need to rehydrate her and the best way to rehydrate an athlete is by giving an intravenous fluid. So we gave her a few intravenous fluids, and she started eating and drinking. She is perfectly normal physically and medically. We’ve got her blood tests done just as a precautionary measure.”
Vinesh Phogat didn’t sleep whole night after reaching final & was working hard to shed extra 2 kg, but missed mark by 100 gram, is now hospitalized.
How do we even recover from this? This is probably the most cruel, shattering, heartbreaking incident in Indian Sports History 💔 pic.twitter.com/clsvak1mQR
— sohom (@AwaaraHoon) August 7, 2024
“These extreme measures left Vinesh weak, fragile, and dehydrated”
A member of her team told Sportstar, “Her normal weight is 57 kg, and she did everything to drop down to 50 kg. She was 49.9 kg yesterday (Tuesday) morning, but as soon as she had even a small meal, her weight bounced back to at least 53 kg. She needed to reach this weight to have the strength to compete in three bouts.” These extreme measures left Vinesh weak, fragile, and dehydrated. She was taken to a medical center inside the Olympic village after feeling dizzy and briefly losing consciousness.
Athletes in contact sports frequently abstain from food and water for two days before the weigh-in. Boxer Nikhat Zareen, following her loss in Paris, revealed that she had gone without food and water for two days to remain within the weight limit, which left her weakened.
Vinesh was not the only wrestler disqualified in the 50kg category due to weight issues. Italy’s Emanuela Liuzzi also had to forfeit her preliminary bout on Tuesday after being found overweight.
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