Tejaswin Shankar was a picture of relief after his historic Bronze medal at the CWG 2022, India’s first ever medal in High-jump at the competition.
With this feat, he also opened an Indian athletics account at the current edition. The man who nearly didn’t make it to Birmingham was happy to just be able to come back with a medal, which he said was not his, but the country’s through him.
Speaking exclusively with News18, Shankar was gracious when talking about the court battle he had to fight against the Athletics Federation of India (AFI), which had initially decided to not send him to CWG despite achieving a qualification mark because he had skipped an inter-state meet for the NCAA championship in the USA.
“It’s been a roller coaster of a journey to be able to get here. I wouldn’t say there are any hard feelings. But at the end of the day, we all, be it Athletics Federation or SAI or the athlete, the only thing one is concerned about is to maximize the medal tally for the country.
“Everybody has their own way of doing it and yes there might be a difference of opinion and yes, in this case, there was. But ultimately I was given the opportunity and I was able to make the most of it. At that point, the only thing I could have done was bring a medal and add to the tally. And the fact that I did that, I am just grateful," Shankar said.
“Woh kehte hai der aaye durust aaye."
“It (the medal) just means the whole world to me and my family. Even during the opening ceremony, I was sitting in my house. So, my mother said I really don’t think you are going to go.
“And I was like please mom please don’t say all these things. ‘Aise apshagun mat bolo, achaa bolo."
“Then next day we found out that we were going so everything happened so fast we never really had the time to process or had the time to get excited about the possibility of competing in the commonwealth games against all these stalwart athletes.’
“So for me, it was just pick up your bag and go moment. It just didn’t kick in.
“I had a WhatsApp call with the enitre family post medal and everybody was so excited. My grandmother was up watching," he further said.
While he isn’t bitter about the experience, Shankar says he did have to acclimatise quickly and adapt to the situation.
“So, as an athlete, I feel one thing we all like is certainty and we try and build our training regimen around that. And in my case, that was the one thing I didn’t have. I wasn’t sure what I was training for," he said.
“But the other thing we as athletes always look for is to try and be adaptable and try and find some sort of a way to tackle all situations. And that’s what I think I was able to bank on. Even though things didn’t happen the way I wanted them to happen, I feel through the adversity I was able to find a way to actually make my training regimen, make things happen and not be picky about stuff, and actually go through my stuff by being more adaptive to my surrounding.
“Before I landed in Birmingham, there were lots of ifs and buts and whether I will be here or not. Once I landed I just knew that we just had one objective that is to bring the medal for the country," he said.
“The medal is not mine. The medal is for the country. It’s just a medal through me."
Now after etching his name in history books forever, Shankar plays down his achievement.
“That’s okay. I mean that’s for you guys to figure out. I mean for me I just go there, compete and come back. I don’t look back at what I did and how many cms or mms. For me, it’s just like I did my best on that day. Since that day I haven’t even looked at videos of my jump because I just feel nervous and anxious. I just don’t want to go back and live that moment again. If I go back to competition videos, I’ll go like ‘oh I could have done this, I could have done that.
“I don’t want any regrets about my performance. So for me, the competition part is over now. I just want to celebrate with my family and hang out with my friends," Shankar added.
While Shankar had to settle for bronze and couldn’t quite touch his personal best this season, he feels, he did read the conditions well which he expected to produce a low-jumping competition.
“Being an outdoor sport, I felt that after 7-8 PM, Birmingham starts to get a bit chilly. Our final was at 7 PM. So I knew that I had to make sure that I didn’t have any misses because as it got colder in the evening, it will be difficult for everybody.
“So, the guys who finished first and second with 2.25m, those guys have jumped 2.36m and 2.37m. So they are extremely capable of jumping higher. And I too am capable of jumping way higher. But that given day, it was a bit chilly and so it was affecting everybody," Shankar concluded.
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