Hurdles PB and jumps gold — all in a day’s work for Moumita at National Games 2025
Moumita Mondal ran the best race of her career, clocking a personal best of 13.36 to finish second in the women’s 100m hurdles at the National Games in Dehradun on Sunday evening.
There’s little time to celebrate. While race winner Jyothi Yarraji and bronze medallist Vithya Ramraj pose for the cameras, 23-year-old Moumita is nowhere to be seen.
She jogged to the other side of the athletics track and immediately sprang down the runway to take her first jump in the women’s long jump competition.
Still exhausted from her sprint and her legs flush with lactic acid, Moumita made a below-par opening jump of 5.99m. As she recovered, she eventually jumped 6.21m jump in her fourth attempt. It was not her best ever jump but on Sunday, it won her a gold medal – her first at a senior national competition.
It’s not uncommon for track and field athletes to compete in multiple events, although the combination of track and field is rarer. Moumita has herself competed in the 100m hurdles and the long jump in multiple competitions last year.
In most cases, there’s always been some amount of time between the two events. At the National Games, the two events were scheduled in almost overlapping times – the long jump competition starting at 2.45 and the 100m hurdles beginning 15 minutes later.
Moumita says she knew the events were clashing when the competition dates were announced. Her coach tried to get the federation to shift the schedule but failed. “If the hurdles event were first, I might have run them and then competed in the long jump, but this time, the long jump was starting first. The officials told me I could finish the hurdles and then come to the long jump, but because I could only come after the competition started, I would have to forfeit my first jump (athletes get six attempts).
Although the officials didn’t budge, her competitors did.“All of them were very nice. They saw that my events were clashing, so they all decided to wait for me,” she says.
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So they all watched as Moumita took up the lane beside National record holder Yarraji at the start of the 100m hurdles final. As the starter’s gun went off, it was Moumita who took the early lead before Yarraji pulled level and then overtook her to win in 13.10 seconds.
Looking back at her race, Moumita is pleased. The timing is a new personal best for her – her previous best before the national games was 13.64 at the Federation Cup in Bhubaneswar last year. “In all my races until now, I’ve always knocked down one of the hurdles. I always slowed down because of it. This is the first time I’ve run a completely clean race,” Moumita says.
There wasn’t any time to do this sort of analysis on Sunday evening, though.
Never give up
She is gasping for breath after just her first attempt. On seeing it’s just 5.99m, Moumita knows she needs to take a break. She does it, forfeits her second attempt and reserves her energy to make her winning jump on her third attempt.
Despite skipping an attempt, there’s no question of giving up for the athlete. “Everyone knows I am a fighter. My coach (James Hillier at the Reliance Foundation) always tells me – Moumita, you are a Bengal tiger,” she says.
Moumita won’t give up on the long jump event in particular, as it is her favourite event. “I carry a lot of josh (energy) to the long jump because it’s my favourite event. It doesn’t matter if I finish last or second or first. I just free my mind and jump. But my body was tired. So at that time, I thought of the difficult situations I’ve been through, and that got me through. I will never give up. I’ve had difficult times in my life. I’ve had moments where I wanted to quit, but I never did. I remember where I come from. When I remember this, I never step back. I get stronger,” she says.
Being the younger of two daughters of a tea seller in the village of Jirar in West Bengal’s Hooghly district, Moumita is no stranger to struggle. It is sports that’s always been the bright spark in her life.
She first took up athletics at a ground near her home before joining an academy in the town of Seerampur in Hooghly district. “I had a lot of struggles. I would get up at 3 am. I would make my food and then travel two hours by train to my academy. Then I’d come back and study. It was difficult, but I never saw it that way because I love sports. My only motivation is just that,” Moumita adds.
It’s that drive that saw Moumita progress through the ranks, first as a long jumper and then as a hurdler. She eventually joined a modern training facility at the Reliance Foundation in Mumbai but never forgot where she came from and her love to compete.
Apart from hurdles and long jump, Moumita attempted the heptathlon – finishing second at the Open National Championships in Bangalore last year, saying it was one of the more intense experiences of her career.
Challenging choice
There are times when Moumita’s desire to compete can act as an obstacle. While a shoulder injury currently prevents her from competing in the combined events, there are concerns that her long jump might be affecting her hurdling and vice versa.
“I am very fast between the hurdles, but I usually clear the hurdles by too much. The hurdles are 84 centimetres tall, and I usually jump something like 90-100 cm. That’s a waste of time and energy. There are girls who run much slower than me but have much better technique. The issue is that my take off leg in the long jump is the same as the one with which I take off over the hurdle. So, I usually jump a little higher than I should. It’s something that I am working on,” she says.
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The exhaustion she feels after competing in the hurdles also limits the length of her jumps. “I couldn’t take my last attempt because I was so tired. That tiredness also made it hard for me to hit the long jump take-off board. I didn’t hit it even once. I missed it by some 20-25 cm every time. If I had hit the board, I could have jumped 6.45m or even 6.50m. I could have had a personal best (her current best stands at 6.41m),” she admits.
Despite this, Moumita says she will never quit any of her events. “My long-term goal is to take part in the 2028 Olympics but I still don’t know which I should focus on. It could be the long jump, hurdles or the heptathlon. I will do all of them and the one I am best in, is the one I’ll take part in the Olympics,” she concludes.
