Relay team’s time slower than 1984: PT Usha

Rohit Mahajan

Tribune News Service

Paris, August 10

PT Usha, president of the Indian Olympic Association, was unimpressed with the show put up by the women’s 4x400 relay team.

The performance by Vithya Ramraj, Jyothika Sri Dandi, MR Poovamma and Subha Venkatesan was indeed underwhelming. Clocking three minutes, 32.51 seconds, the four were some four seconds slower than their season’s best and finished eighth out of eight in the second heat — 15th out of 16 teams, and out of the competition.

“We were faster than them 40 years ago,” said Usha. Indeed she and her teammates were faster at Los Angeles 1984. MD Valsamma, Vandana Rao, Shiny Abraham and Usha clocked 3:32.49 at the 1984 Olympics, some two-hundredths of a second faster than Vithya, Jyothika, Poovamma and Subha were last night.

Taming of Yazdani

The sight of Hassan Yazdani, the great Iranian grappler, fighting with one arm reduced some of his fans to tears at the Palais de Mars arena. “This is sad, very sad,” said Farhat Hasan, who travelled from London to cheer for the Iranian wrestlers. “He would have won gold if he had been OK.”

He probably would have — if he had had the use of both his arms. In the event, troubled by an injury, he was beaten by Bulgaria’s Magomed Ramazanov in the men’s 86kg freestyle final last night.

Ramazanov, born in Russia, won 7-1, but it was clear that he was fighting a man in great pain. Yazdani, winner of the 74kg gold at the Rio Olympics in 2016 and 86kg silver in Tokyo in 2021, was in obvious pain right from the start and asked for a medical timeout soon after the bout started. He got the bout stopped five times in all and conceded one point for passivity in the first period — with 30 seconds to score, he came close to completing a takedown of Ramazanov.

Yazdani managed to score a point in the second period; the score was 1-1 but the Iranian led on criteria, for Ramazanov had scored only through a penalty point.

But Ramazanov finally managed to take advantage of Yazdani’s injury — he tripped Yazdani down and trapped him in an uncomfortable position to more points for exposure. Six points to the Bulgarian in a few seconds, the lead now 7-1. Yazdani, with 30 seconds left on the clock, raised his left hand in a gesture of defeat — the pain was just too much for him, and it was too much for his teary-eyed fans.

Grant, the lone fighter

Shortly after winning the 110m hurdles gold, Grant Holloway of the US made biting remarks about the way he’s treated by the world — sponsors, US athletics association (USATF), the athletics fraternity, et al.

“I think I’m one of the top five athletes in this sport, and I get treated, I think, lesser than,” Holloway said.

The top hurdler of the US, Grant blew his lead in the Tokyo Olympics final three years ago to finish second behind Jamaica’s Hansle Parchment. Grant lost in the final 10 metres, and it hurt — he knew he had to win in Paris to get the respect he desperately wanted.

“The USATF doesn’t want my talent. They don’t want me. I’m the lost kid on ‘Toy Story.’ I get thrown in a corner, and I’m lost for six months. They don’t want my talent,” he said.

He doesn’t have a watch deal, he said; he doesn’t have the love of his association, he added. But, he added in powerful, stirring words, he doesn’t care. “As long as my coach, my family... As long as they’re OK, I need none of it,” said Holloway. Indeed, gold in his hands, having found his place among the greats, he needs none of it.