“It feels good to return after defending my Asian Games medal”: Neeraj Chopra

Hyderabad (Telangana) [India]: India’s ‘Golden Boy’ Neeraj Chopra expressed his delight after returning to the country after defending his gold medal at the 19th Asian Games.

Neeraj successfully defended his gold medal while Kishore Jena broke his personal best in back-to-back throws and came close to Neeraj’s season-best throw of 88.88m with his 87.54m in the men’s javelin throw final event.

“It feels good to return to India after defending my Asian Games medal. We visited Gopichand Academy and met Para athletes who are going to play in the Asian Games,” Neeraj told media.

He also went on to talk about being glad to see youngsters showing interest in the javelin after watching him perform well in the world’s biggest tournaments.

“Well, I can only speak about javelin on whether my achievements are going to inspire many more to take up athletics. Yes, I am glad to say that a lot of boys and girls are showing great interest in javelin after my feats,” Neeraj said in a press conference.

Neeraj visited Hyderabad for the first time since 2015 and went on to talk about his journey which began in this state.

“Yes, it has been a very tough journey and interestingly the first thoughts of how it would be to make it to the Olympics first crossed my thoughts here in this City in 2015 when I competed in the Junior Fed Cup meet and won a gold,” he said.

“Honestly, to reach this level I had to put in a lot of effort, stay focussed and overcome a lot of hardship like travelling in trains in unreserved compartments and sharing accommodation with many other fellow athletes,” Chopra added.