“It will be fun to compete with him,” Olympic and World Champion Neeraj Chopra had said when asked about his assessment of young German Max Dehning in April.
Dehning was 19-years-old in February when he became the youngest to throw 90 metres in Halle. Dehning hit the headlines, the history-maker’s unexpected upswing in distance became a talking point too. From a best of 79.13 metres, Dehning had surged to 90.20m. The rise of a new German challenger months before the Olympics was an exciting prospect.
On Tuesday evening, Neeraj and Dehning will be among the eight men at the Paavo Nurmi Games in Turku, Finland. He has a 90-metre throw against his name, but Dehning hasn’t entered the big league yet. Since his big throw, he has orbited between the 80-82 metre mark. A 12th-place finish in the European Championships last week saw him dip to 76.16 metres. “Your only competition is yourself,” he had posted on Instagram from Rome.
Neeraj vs Dehning is not the storyline but just an interesting footnote because on current form, the world and European Under-20 silver medallist is unlikely to
create an upset in a competitive field.
There are others Neeraj will have to watch out for when he makes a return after skipping the Ostrava Golden Spike last month because of discomfort of the adductor muscle after competing in back-to-back events in Doha and Bhubaneshwar.
Turku will be the last but one competition for Neeraj before the Paris Summer Games for the Olympic champion. Neeraj had clarified that skipping Ostrava was precautionary. Turku will present an opportunity to evaluate how his body responds during competition. Not for the first time the adductor muscle has troubled Neeraj and a discomfort-free outing will be a confidence booster for the 26-year-old.
Target: High 80s throw
Getting back to the high 80s too will be an all-is-well sign after a dip in his last outing, the Federation Cup in Bhubaneshwar — just four days after the Doha Diamond League. He touched 82.27 metres in his fourth attempt at the Federation Cup and then skipped the last two rounds not wanting to strain his body.
The Federation Cup was not on the star javelin thrower’s original schedule but he travelled to Bhubaneshwar after a call with Athletics Federation of India (AFI) officials. Chopra said he wasn’t keen to participate in the June-end Inter-State Championships at Panchkula, a competition mandatory for all Olympics-bound athletes as per AFI policy since it would disturb his training and competition schedule in Europe. The only option before him, hence was the Federation Cup.
There are big names in Turku with pedigree to test Neeraj, though the highly consistent Jakub Vadlejch, the athlete from Czechia who has consistently run Neeraj close over the past two seasons and even bested him at the Doha Diamond League in May and last year’s Diamond League Finals won’t be there.
A bigger star cast was set to line up but there have been pull-outs. Arshad Nadeem from Pakistan, a World Championship and Asian Games medallist was to make a comeback after elbow surgery but his name is no longer on the official entry list. Julian Webber, the silver medalist at the European Championships also withdrew.
That leaves local favourite Oliver Helander, the 2022 winner, as the strongest challenger to Neeraj. There’s also Grenada’s Anderson Peters, the 2022 World Champion, not having the best of seasons after being involved in a brawl on a boat two years ago. Peters registered 86.62 metres to finish third at the Doha Diamond League, behind second-placed Neeraj.
After a month away from competition, this will feel like a mini-comeback for Neeraj and his legion of fans.
Despite winning everything there is to win, Chopra recently picked just one throw as special. An indication of how high he has set the bar for himself.
In a recent interview with cricketer Dinesh Karthik on the show ‘Get Set Gold’, Neeraj said: “To date, I am only satisfied with one throw of mine, which was 86.48 m in the World Under-20 Championships 2016. That was one throw where I felt it was a special, unique one, but I have not been satisfied with any throw since.”
On Tuesday evening, he will trade a pain-free outing over a special throw as the Olympics is around the corner.