SONEPET: Promising to be 100 per cent fit for the new season, India's two-time Olympic medal-winning javelin throw star Neeraj Chopra said on Friday that a podium finish at the 2025 World Championships in Tokyo is his next big target.
The 26-year-old is back in India after wrapping up his season with a second-place finish at the Diamond League finale in Brussels. This followed his historic achievement of becoming the first Indian track-and-field athlete to claim successive Olympic medals, adding a silver in Paris to the gold he won in Tokyo.
"The season is over now. The biggest target for next year is the World Championship, and we will begin preparations for that now. The Olympics are always on our minds, but we have four years for that," Neeraj told PTI Videos on the sidelines of a conference on 'Mission Olympics 2036' organised at the Sports University of Haryana.
The World Championships are scheduled to take place from 13th to 21st September next year.
Chopra had to battle an adductor muscle niggle throughout the year, which affected his performance at both the Olympics and the Diamond League finale, where he also competed with a fractured left hand. He had earlier mentioned consulting doctors at the end of the season to decide whether to undergo surgery to fix the issue.
When asked about his fitness, Chopra downplayed concerns and confirmed that he would be working on his technique in the off-season. "It was an injury-plagued year but the injury is fine now. I will be 100 per cent fit for the new season," he asserted. "Technical issues are also there, but we will work on them. I will look to improve my technique. I do like to train in India, but when competitions start, I prefer to train abroad."
Reflecting on India's Olympic performance, which yielded six medals but no gold this time, Chopra noted that the country could have won more, as reflected by the half a dozen fourth-place finishes. "There were a lot of fourth positions. (But) this time, we had a very good performance in the Paralympics and won several medals. In the coming times, we expect strong performances in both the Olympics and the Paralympics," said Chopra.
Chopra has been striving to hit the 90m mark but has not managed it so far, despite coming close. At the Paris Olympics, his silver-winning throw was 89.45m, with Pakistan's Arshad Nadeem taking gold and breaking the Games record with a 92.97m effort. At the Diamond League finale, Chopra threw 87.86m, missing the top spot by just one centimetre.