These are difficult times for Dipa Karmakar; tough, testing, strenuous and outright demanding. On her return, post the Rio Olympics 2016, right after claiming a historic fourth place finish, her coach Bisweshwar Nandi had said, “It’s too soon to speak about the future. But there could be changes in the routine as she will need to do something new. At the moment, thinking about the Tokyo Olympics is way off.” He had been asked about the 2018 CWG and the four-year interim period till the Tokyo Olympics.
Come to think of it, Tokyo is hardly two years away and both coach and Dipa are still to get into the circuit that could actually see her striking some kind of form, with her coach and analysts trying to understand what could be in store for a gymnast who came close to an Olympic medal and is now faced with a new routine that requires her to start all over again.
But the bigger issue than form or changing a set routine has been the injury. “I have an ACL (Anterior Crucial Ligament) tear. I don’t want to take pressure,” says Dipa. Nandi doesn’t specify when the injury happened. But, as it happens in gymnastics where a landing or vault is under high stress factors, it could have been lingering, and then with pain increasing, surgery was needed. An ACL typically takes six to eight months to heal and that, too, with expert rehabilitation under the eyes of experienced doctors. With the surgery happening in April, it would be December before Dipa starts even looking at doing stronger routines which now, as she and Nandi both say, will be the Handspring 540. Because of the surgery, the Asian Championships were given a miss and then the World Championships in Canada. “I don’t think missing a few major championships should put us back,” asserts Nandi. Though he admits that doing the Handspring 540 will require months and hours of training before it becomes a medal-winning routine.
Is it possible to get a medal at the CWG in April? “Surely, but we need to see how the injury is going at the moment and whether she can take peak training and then the stress of competition,” explains Nandi. But training and competition are just two different factors in a medal-winning strategy for any athlete. Faced with elimination, a body undergoes a different stress and the mind of the athlete is also on the injury and whether the routine can, in any way, undo the healing.
Col Nayak, previously with the Indian hockey team at the 2012 London Olympics and now heading sports injuries at Delhi’s Safdarjung Hospital and also the physio for P. Sreejesh, the Indian goalkeeper, says, “Recovery is possible but how you bring an athlete back from something as crucial as ACL is important. It’s the rehabilitation that matters. And I just wish, they don’t rush the athlete back into competition.” Col Nayak says that it depends on the athlete how they cope with the baggage of injury at a top-level competition. “But with a strong coach and a good team it’s not difficult to shepherd an athlete through the stress of competition.”
Dipa won a bronze at the last CWG in Glasgow. But she hasn’t given up hope for April, 2018. “My main target is 2020 Tokyo Games,” she says. “If I can perform Handspring 540 with perfection, I can win a medal at CWG.” Speaking on being out of training for almost 6 to 8 months, she confidently said: “It’s all about practice. And once I know the competition, I will train with an eye on the medal.”
The Handspring 540 is a twist movement in the air and it’s the most difficult vault after the Produnova. The Produnova has lost 6/10th of its score (down from 7.0 to 6.4) and that also played a part in Dipa skipping the routine altogether. Of course, the ACL was the primary reason to switch the routine. Nandi has his work cut out. There is more pressure on the duo, now that Rio gave a glimpse of a medal. But within four years of competition, unless you are in the top four consistently through the next four, it’s difficult to repeat performances. Younger athletes in gymnastic friendly nations with a high degree of coaching ability are coming in hundreds. By the time Dipa lands in Tokyo, the landscape would have changed. And, crucially, she would be almost 28, an age where most are already thinking of switching to coaching. But Nandi is not too worried about things like age and all. “We start late in India and we mature late too,” he explains. “The most important thing is to maintain fitness and be mentally fit for competitions.”
Gymnasts across the world are chasing difficult routines with serious injuries increasing by the day. Many believe, the accumulative scoring system that was brought in to replace the 10.0 format following a judging scandal at the 2004 Athens Olympics is the reason for a spate of injuries. Hambuchen, the 2007 horizontal bar world champion, had a point when he said: “It’s a pity that gymnastics has developed the way it has. Everyone is chasing more and more difficulty, more risk. Everyone wants new records so it’s getting dangerous.”
In today’s scoring system, there are two different scores taken into contention. The D (difficulty) score involves adding up the toughest and most difficult routine while all gymnasts start with a 10.0 E (execution) score from which points are taken away for flaws such as bending legs, bad landings and falls. The two added scores then make up the final tally.
While Dipa works on her rehab and looks towards a possible countdown to 2020 Tokyo, it would be good to look up to or maybe even call Oksana Chusovitina, the gymnast who represented Germany at Rio at 41. Oksana won a gold way back in 92’ Barcelona for The Unified Team and then competed for Uzbekistan before winning silver in Beijing as a German. If there is an inspiration for Dipa, it’s Oksana with seven Olympic and five World Championship medals.
