Vinesh Phogat Retirement: Vinesh Phogat on Thursday announced her retirement from wrestling. This comes a day after she faced disqualification from the 50kg category finals at the Paris Olympics 2024 for being 100 grams overweight in the morning weigh-in.
Vinesh had scripted history by becoming the first Indian woman wrestler to reach the gold medal bout in her category on Tuesday night. She was assured of at least a silver medal before the disqualification.
She announced her decision in a post on X. "Mother, wrestling defeated me. I lost. Forgive me. Your dream, my courage, everything is shattered. I don't have any strength left now. Goodbye wrestling 2001-2024," she wrote.
On Wednesday, Phogat appealed against her Olympics disqualification in the Court of Arbitration for Sports (CAS), demanding that she be awarded a joint silver medal after being forced out for being 100gm overweight in the morning weigh-in. An Indian Olympic Association(IOA) source in the visiting Indian contingent confirmed the development to PTI.
"Yes we got to know about it. It has been done by her team," said the source. She had to be taken to a polyclinic at the Games village owing to severe dehydration caused by her desperate measures to make the cut, which included going hungry, avoiding fluids and staying up all night to sweat it out.
An ad-hoc division of the CAS has been set up here for resolution by arbitration of any disputes arising during the Olympic Games or during a period of 10 days preceding the Opening Ceremony.
The matter will be taken up on Thursday morning. Cuban wrestler Yusneylis Guzman Lopez, who lost to Vinesh in the semifinals, replaced her in the final against American Sarah Ann Hildebrandt. She won the bout to claim gold and Vinesh is now banking on CAS to be a joint silver-medallist with Lopez.