New Delhi [India], September 29 (ANI): Managing Saikhom Mirabai Chanu's training load to keep her injury-free while ensuring she peaked at the Asian Games was the primary focus of the chief coach of the Indian national weightlifting team, Vijay Sharma, who said the approach ultimately helped the Indian weightlifter secure the silver medal that had eluded her at the continental showpiece.
Mirabai returned to India on Tuesday morning after winning silver in the women's 49kg category at the Aichi-Nagoya Asian Games, completing her medal collection at the major international events.
Talking to ANI in New Delhi, Sharma said the training programme was specifically designed to prevent injury after Chanu's previous Asian Games campaign had ended in disappointment.
"We had been eagerly awaiting this medal; luckily, thanks to Mira's hard work, she secured it, bringing immense joy to both the country and me. Her efforts truly paid off. We had a single aim because we had missed the Asian Games previously due to injury; in the last competition, too, an injury had left us finishing fourth," he told ANI.
"My goal was simply to design a training program that would keep Mira injury-free, and we succeeded in that. We managed the training load to ensure peak performance without risking injury; luckily, we succeeded, and the result was winning the medal," the Dronacharya Awardee coach added.
The 32-year-old Chanu lifted a combined 198kg to win silver, completing all three of her snatch attempts at 83kg, 85kg and 87kg before lifting 107kg and 111kg in her first two clean and jerk attempts.
North Korea's Ri Song Gum won gold with a total of 215kg, while Wijayana claimed bronze.
The medal marked a significant moment in Chanu's career as the 32-year-old finally added an Asian Games medal to a collection that already includes an Olympic silver, three Commonwealth Games gold medals, a World Championships gold and medals at the Asian Championships.
Chanu had missed out on the podium at the Hangzhou Asian Games in 2023 after an injury forced her to withdraw from her final clean and jerk attempt, leaving her fourth.
Three years later, she returned to the Asian Games and secured the silver that had been missing from her medal cabinet.
Chanu had entered the Asian Games on the back of a gold medal at the Glasgow Commonwealth Games 2026, her third Commonwealth Games title after victories at the 2018 Gold Coast and 2022 Birmingham editions.
With her Asian Games silver, Chanu also became the second Indian weightlifter after Karnam Malleshwari to win medals at the Olympics, Asian Games, Commonwealth Games, World Championships, Asian Championships and Commonwealth Championships. (ANI)
"Goal was to design a training program that would keep Mirabai injury-free": Weightlifting coach Vijay Sharma after Chanu's Asiad silver
