NAGOYA: Neeru Dhanda did not have the easiest preparation for the Asian Games. She fell ill and could not train for over three-and-a-half weeks during the national camp before the Games. She spent three of those days in the hospital on a liquid diet and drips.
Nature did not go easy on her during the women's trap event at the Games as well. It was raining on Monday and Tuesday and Neeru could feel the rain drops on her hands. But in spite of everything, she scripted history with India's first women's trap gold and a Games record.
The 26-year-old stands at five feet two inches and holds a special gun. Usually DT 11 Beretta guns (black edition), the one she uses, are between 47.5 and 51.6 (3.9 feet to 4.3 feet). The barrel length is 30 inches and the wooden stock had to be retrofitted for her height. The Madhya Pradesh Academy helped her with this and the stock was made from walnut wood in Italy and cost around Rs 1 lakh. For Neeru, though, it makes no difference. "It's fine, how does height matter?" she asked.
Her history-making feat also helped India break the gold medal drought after the two kabaddi gold medals. And Neeru dedicated the gold to India's first trap gold medallist in 1978, Randhir Singh, who passed away this year.
Usually, life's greatest moments are carved when destiny has other plans. Neeru had fallen ill in Delhi and was hospitalised for three days. She survived only on liquids. The entire shotgun team, including her personal and foreign coaches, was worried. It looked like she might miss the flight to Nagoya for the Asian Games. It was that bad.
On top of that, she missed a significant number of training days. No firing. It was only in the last two days before the big event, the qualification day, that she got time to shoot in the beautiful Aichi Prefectural shooting range here.
India's shotgun coach Peter Wilson elaborated on her illness just before the Games. "She had not trained for three-and-a-half weeks," he said. "She shot for two days here (Nagoya). She is very talented, but she puts a huge amount of work in."
The illness was terrible and Neeru was confined to her room during the entire national camp. "For five days I didn't eat anything. I was surviving on water," she recalled. But her personal coach, Mansher Singh, asked her to not lose hope. "After the illness, I spoke with my coach daily. He used to tell me 'Neeru, you will go'. Even after coming here, I was talking to him on the phone daily. Every day, he kept me motivated."
It was raining on the day when the shotgun players stepped on their platforms for the final. And the rain didn't stop until the end. With Neeru recovering only a few days ago, the rain was the last thing she would have wanted. However, she was in no mood to give up. Neeru had a steady round and ended with a record score of 28, two points ahead of China's Sun Yunong and seven points ahead of bronze medallist Abdulmalik Hajar.
The wet conditions here were not alien to her. But the rain was pouring straight into her. It was battering her hands and it was cold. It was difficult to look at the flying projectiles. "The challenge here was that rain was coming from above, falling on my hands and you could feel it. It's very easy to stray a bit from the process," she said.
The pressure of the final was intense. For shooters, it was even more after a horrendous collective outing so far. "You feel it, and the mind strays a bit from the process," Neeru said. "It was about talking to oneself repeatedly — 'Neeru, this will happen; even if a storm comes, don't look down on yourself, keep looking up, elevate your process'."
For someone who started shooting with a rusty double-barrel gun over a pond, inspired by watching her cousin Lakshay Sheoran shoot, her latest exploit is a vindication of everything she has sacrificed so far. She shifted her base from the safe confines of her home in Jind, Haryana to Bhopal — at the Madhya Pradesh Shooting Academy. Coming from a farming background, she could not afford to buy guns and cartridges. "The MP Academy gave us free guns and cartridges," she said.
She spoke about how Mansher brought her to the academy and the support she had got from then sports minister Yashodhara Raje Scindia. That relationship is one she has maintained since with Yashodhara Raje constantly texting her during the Games. "'Neeru, good luck, maintain your full performance,' came on the day I shot 24-24. Then, this morning as well: 'Congratulations, now you have to look at each shot like a bird to hit it. Each of our shots will write the future'."
The rusty gun, she originally shot with, belonged to Lakshay’s father. And when Lakshay won a silver in the Jakarta Games, she knew she wanted to repeat that feat. She has done one better now.
