Injured Jeremy out of national camp, to miss Asian Games, Paris Olympics 2024

Indian Weightlifting Federation has shunted Commonwealth Games champion Jeremy Lalrinnunga out of the national camp after the latter refused to travel to the US for rehabilitation, federation president Sahdev Yadav said on Thursday.

The decision was taken on July 1. Jeremy, 20, sustained a slip disc injury about a month and a half back during training at the National Institue of Sports (NIS), Patiala. He missed the Asian Games and the World Championships trials on June 30 — held at NIS Patiala — which means his chances to compete at the Asiad as well as next year's Paris Olympics are over.

"World Championships is a mandatory qualifying event for the Olympics. It is sad that a young talent like Jeremy will miss the Paris Games," Yadav said.

"We wanted to send him to St. Louis in the USA for rehabilitation under the guidance of Dr. Aaron Horschig. There is no better place for injury rehab in my opinion, considering the way Dr. Horschig has worked on Mirabai Chanu. The proposal was cleared by TOPS too but Jeremy wrote to me saying he doesn't want to go. He didn't even state a reason for his refusal. He has been taking medical advice from a Mumbai-based doctor," Yadav added.

Jeremy, who competes in the 67kg class, is currently undergoing his rehabilitation at the Army Sports Institute in Pune. He will now have to earn his place back in the national camp after winning the national championships that are tentatively scheduled early next year.

"He is a strong, talented prospect and we will welcome him back in the national camp whenever he qualifies. Had he continued to remain the way he was at the Youth Olympic Games where he won a gold, he would have gone really far."

Besides Jeremy, Sanket Sargar (55kg) who won a silver medal at last year's Commonwealth Games, has also been released from the camp.

"Sanket's performance was regularly going down. Even the juniors were doing better, so he didn't merit a place," Yadav said.

Meanwhile Tokyo Olympics silver medallist Mirabai Chanu is on her way to full fitness and will compete at the World Championships in Riyadh (Sept 2-17) as well as the Hangzhou Asian Games (Sept 23-Oct 8). Chanu is undergoing training and rehabilitation under Dr. Horschig in the US from where she will travel to Riyadh for Worlds. The 28-year-old will go to Hangzhou from Riyadh.

"She is very close to regaining full fitness. I speak to her daily. Her training intensity is currently at 95 percent and will soon hit 100 percent. There was a niggle in her thigh too that she developed in Patiala but she has recovered from it," Yadav said.

Chanu finished ninth at the 2014 Asian Games and didn't participate in the 2018 edition. Yadav ruled out fresh injury threat to Chanu despite Worlds and Asiad bunched together. Asian Games is not an Olympic qualifier for weightlifting.

Commonwealth, Asian C'ships in India

India will host the 2023 Commonwealth senior, junior and youth championship as well as the Asian junior and youth championship next month at the Gautam Buddha University in Greater Noida. The Commonwealth Championship will be held from July 12–16 while the Asian event will run from July 28 - Aug 5.

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