An Indian wrestler who had been hoping to become her country’s first ever female Olympic champion was disqualified only hours before the gold medal bout because she was “a few grams” over the weight limit.
News of Vinesh Phogat’s elimination from the 50kg wrestling competition at the Paris Olympics shocked Indian sports fans. Her disqualification was announced in a statement from the Indian Olympic Association, which said the 29-year-old had weighed in “a few grams” over 50kg despite “the best efforts by the team through the night."
In wrestling and other Olympic combat sports, athletes will often “weight-cut” to qualify for lower weight categories, which means shedding as much as 10 percent of their body weight in the run-up to a competition.
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They are officially weighed in on the morning of a bout and are free to eat and drink afterward, before they take to the mat. But that can be a problem in competitions like the Olympics, where they have to fight on successive days.
According to media reports out of India, Vinesh had easily made the weight before her semifinal bout on Tuesday against Cuba’s Yusneylis Guzman, whom she beat 5-0 with two decisive takedowns.
But on Tuesday evening, a team weigh-in showed that she had put on more than two kilograms over the course of the day—leaving her facing a qualification battle.
There followed a sleepless night as Vinesh ran, skipped, cycled, and took saunas to try to shed the excess weight. Some reports, which could not be confirmed, said she had even had her hair cut and blood drawn to make the weight.
But at the weigh-in, it was not enough. She is thought to have still been around 100 grams over the 50kg limit—giving Guzman, her vanquished semifinal opponent, another chance against American wrestler Sarah Hildebrandt.
Vinesh herself was reportedly taken for treatment in the Olympic village hospital after fainting after the weigh-in. Pictures on Indian media showed her slumped on the floor of the weigh-in room.
Her elimination led to a bizarre political row and a parliamentary walkout in Delhi by opposition MPs who said Narendra Modi’s BJP government had not done enough to protect her.
Vinesh is a well-known figure after leading a revolt last year by women wrestlers against Brij Bhushan, then-head of the Indian Wrestling Federation and a BJP MP, accusing him of groping and sexual harassment. Vinesh was manhandled by police at a protest near parliament.
While opposition MPs claimed the wrestler had been victim of a BJP conspiracy, Modi himself paid tribute to her on X, calling her a “pride and inspiration for each and every Indian.”
“Today’s setback hurts. I wish words could express the sense of despair that I am experiencing. At the same time, I know that you epitomise resilience. It has always been your nature to take challenges head on. Come back stronger! We are all rooting for you,” he wrote.
