Former AFI president Adille J Sumariwalla on Saturday said the federation will now place “special focus” on building strong 4x100m relay teams for both men and women, following a mixed performance at the Asian Athletics Championships in Gumi, South Korea.
The comment has come on the heels of a strong showing by the Indian women’s 4x100m relay team, featuring Abinaya Rajarajan, Sneha SS, Srabani Nanda, and Nithya Gandhe, who clocked a season-best 43.86 seconds to win India’s final silver medal of the meet.
However, the men’s 4x100m team faced disappointment after being disqualified in the heats despite finishing second that could have secured them a spot in the final.
The team, comprising Manikanta Hoblidar, Amlan Borgohain, Rahul Kumar, and Pranav Gurav, was marked disqualified for a baton exchange outside the takeover zone, violating Rule 24.7.
“One of the things we have already discussed today in one of our meetings is that we are going to give special focus on the 4x100m men and women relay,” said Sumariwalla in a virtual media interaction.
“We believe that both these relays which we were not able to put together for a long time, now we are in a position to — we have enough athletes now, including reserves, to be able to run a good 4x100m relay, both men and women. We are giving it special focus from now onwards.”
India signed off the championships with 8 gold, 10 silver, and 6 bronze medals, finishing second in the medals tally behind China.
It marked the country’s best performance since the 2017 edition in Bhubaneswar, where it topped the standings with 29 medals (10 gold, 6 silver, 13 bronze).
Reflecting on India’s impressive overall performance, Sumariwalla highlighted a shift in mindset and improved infrastructure as key factors behind the success.
“I think, one, that the athletes are running far more competitions now than they ever ran. Before, they were scared of competition. Now, our youngsters are not scared of competition,” said the AFI spokesperson.
“They are happy to go out there and fight it out. We have 32 national-level meets now throughout the year. Plus, these athletes are going out running internationally. A lot of them are going straight from here to Taiwan, etc.
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“So, this whole concept of not running and hiding — that phase is over. Today, our athletes are ready to fight, ready to compete with the best athletes anywhere in the world. And that is because they have been running so many more competitions than they ever ran before.”
He also pointed to the rise of decentralised training and greater access to quality coaching from the junior level: “We have a good set of foreign coaches who are guiding them right from the junior level. Before, we used to have coaches only for seniors. Today, we have a lot of coaches starting them from the juniors, especially with the decentralisation of the camps.”
“A lot more athletes have the opportunity to train in places of their choice, in the places of their coaches. There are private institutions. They all have foreign coaches.”
Looking ahead to the World Championships in Tokyo this September, Sumariwalla said: “The present circular is not clear. But we will see. We will take it as it comes. It’s about 3 months from today — about 100 odd days.”
“I don’t think, except for 3 or 4 people, the rest need to spend sleepless nights on the World Championships. I think they are more suited at this point to start training for the Asian Games next year, the Commonwealth Games next year. And get ready for 2028 LA (Los Angeles Olympics). I think the focus should be that.”