The hero of Indian sports in 2021 has to be ace javelin thrower and Olympic champion Neeraj Chopra who created history at the Summer Games and made this year memorable for the sports fans. Currently, Neeraj Chopra is in the United States and is enjoying the simple time of an athlete where all he needs to do is train and prepare for the upcoming events.
He became the second individual Olympics gold medallist for India after Abhinav Bindra’s historic feat at the 2008 Beijing Olympics. Neeraj created a massive hype for athletics back in India and his achievement saw him get felicitated and celebrated all over the country. He attended a lot of ceremonies and even took a break from his training. But soon the 23-year-old that he needs to get back in shape for the Diamond League but with one request after another from government officials saw him fall way short of his targets.
But now living in the United States the ace javelin thrower is only concentrating on his training. He has started his 90-day training at the Chula Vista Elite Athlete Training Centre in San Diego away from the hullabaloo.
“My life here is very simple. I have my breakfast by 7:30 in the morning and then head to the centre where I train for over two hours. We eat our lunch there and then we return to our apartment to rest and recover,” Neeraj said during a media interaction from San Diego.
The youngster highlighted how he again returns to training in the evening aswell. He revealed that he has had to put in hard yards in training but he is enjoying it.
“We head to training again by 4 in the evening. We finish training and return after dinner. After that, it is a normal day where I call up family or friends and rest. I will be honest I have to put a lot of effort in training but I am very happy to get back to training,” he added.
Neeraj also highlighted how he has gained a lot of weight after his historic Gold medal win at the Tokyo Olympics. He ate a lot of Indian food and sweets and did not care much about his diet.
“I love Indian food so I ate everything after Tokyo. I did not think about my diet as an athlete so I gained around 12 to 13 kilograms,” he said.
So the last week was mostly about Neeraj trying to lose weight as he aims to get back in optimal shape. “In the last 20 days I have reduced little over 5 kilos, which is closer to my off-season weight. It was a struggle to get back to training, as I had to force myself to complete the workouts. It was difficult. I had body ache and I had to put in a lot of effort,” he concluded.
