“There is a red line in being emotional. If you are over-emotional, your technique will suffer.”
India’s pistol coach Pavel Smirnov didn’t mince his words while assessing Manu Bhaker’s performance at the ISSF Shooting World Cup in Delhi.
Bhaker, who shot to limelight in March last year when she became the youngest ISSF World Cup gold medallist, finished fifth in the 25m Pistol event on Sunday and then failed to qualify for the finals in her pet 10m air pistol event on Tuesday.
Having won the Commonwealth Games and Youth Olympics gold to end the year on a high, Bhaker was considered one of the favourites to clinch a medal and a Tokyo Olympics quota place for India on the home turf.
However, the 17-year-old first failed to maintain her qualification round form in the 25m pistol event to finish outside the medal bracket and clearly struggled to find her rhythm in the 10m air pistol event to finish 14th with a score of 573.
On Sunday, Bhaker had left the shooting range in tears after the 25m rapid pistol event. Though she did not show similar emotions on Tuesday, she did rush out of the range moments after finishing the qualifying round.
“Manu Bhaker is still learning how to deal with emotions,” Siminrov says. “If a boxer suffers a knockout defeat, he will take time to recover and return to the ring. It is the same for Manu. She couldn’t forget the earlier event and was very emotional when she was firing today.”
Bhaker was erratic in her shooting as she shot series of 95, 96, 94, 95, 95 and 98 in qualifying.
Junior national coach Jaspal Rana, who has trained Bhaker ever since she joined the national camp, believes that pressure of a final was not the problem with the teenager shooter.
“She has shot many finals and she has done well. So that is not the problem with her,” he says.
However, just like 25m Pistol event in Delhi, the 17-year-old had scored a confident 593 to top the qualification round with new Games Record. But she could not maintain that momentum in the final and finished sixth.
Though Rana does not read too much into Bhaker’s final losses, he did advocate the need to keep the shooters away from distraction and also hinted at the role her parents should play.
“The junior team is doing well because I keep them away from distractions,” he says. “I am able to maintain discipline which other people can’t. We need to be a little smarter. Olympics is altogether different. The family needs to understand you don’t get medals with comfort, you get medals with pain. Don’t give them comfort, make them strong.”
While Bhaker still struggles to deal with emotions, Asian Games bronze medallist Heena Sidhu blamed over thinking for her dismal performance on Tuesday.
The 28-year-old shot a score of 571 and finished 25th overall.
“Leading up to this match (I was thinking), aisa karna, waisa karna hai (I have to do this and do that). I feel personally I was overtrained.
“First three series I took a lot of time. I have done very tight matches, time-wise. But sometimes in those matches you use the break wisely. I did take breaks but I wasn’t using them wisely. I was still thinking. I need to stop overthinking and just trust my processes,” she says.
Both Bhaker and Sidhu should have few more opportunities to make amends and win an Olympic berth in the next 12 months. Hopefully, they would manage to keep their emotions under control and get the job done.
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