What awaits Neeraj Chopra at Golden Spike – another Javelin title, record throw or …?

After an injury-marred season in 2024, where he failed to defend his Olympic title losing to Pakistan’s Arshad Nadeem, Neeraj started training under Czech legend Jan Zelenzy and parted ways with his long-term coach Dr Klaus Bartonietz. Neeraj also put an end to the questions of 90m as he crossed the much hyped mark at the Doha Diamond League, throwing 90.23m and creating a new national record.

Talking about his time with Jan, Neeraj said,” I’m really happy to work with such a great athlete and coach. I’ve already thrown 90 m this year after a little bit more improvement in technique, so let’s see when it comes next time, but I’m ready. Recently, we’ve done good training in Nymbuk, so I’ll do my best here in Ostrava.”

“It was not easy; the competition in Paris was quite late. First throw was good, but I don’t know what happened then. My last Diamond League win was in Lausanne 2023, so at the end, I’m happy already having a Diamond League win this year,” he added further about his Paris DL win.

Neeraj will be up against a modest field in Ostrava, with Anderson Peters of Grenada and Thomas Rohler of Germany being his main competitors. While Anderson Peters has a personal best of 93.07m, the 2016 Olympic champion Thomas Rohler has a personal best of 93.90m. However, both of them have struggled in recent times with poor season bests (Peters- 85.64m and Rohler- 80.79m).

Neeraj was supposed to play at the meet last year but had to pull out due to an injury. “When I was a kid, I watched a lot of videos and photos of athletes like Usain Bolt competing here. I came last year, but I didn’t compete because of an injury. Now I feel good, but I don’t want to put any pressure on myself for 90 m. But I’ll try hard,” said Neeraj about competing in Ostrava.

Excited for NC Classic

Recently, Neeraj Chopra announced NC Classic, a Javelin-only event to be held in India annually. World Athletics classified the event as a World Athletics ‘A’ category event, equal to a Continental Tour Gold-level competition in ranking points, making it the most prestigious Athletics event in the country.

It is the realisation of a long-time dream for Neeraj, who has brought significant attention to the sport with exploits at the international level. Talking about his excitement for the NC classic, Neeraj said,” The first competition after Ostrava will be the Neeraj Chopra Classic in Bengaluru. After the Tokyo Olympics, there are a lot of people following javelin in India, so I’m very excited. This will be my first really serious competition in India with international athletes, on 5 July. I still have to manage a lot of things before the competition, but it will be a good experience.”

“Back then, when I was ‘nobody’, I had a dream that people would know something about our sport. So now it would not be good if I were to say no to people. And I’m happy that now in India people recognise sports other than cricket,” said Neeraj.

After Bengaluru, Neeraj will have his eyes set on the World Championships in Tokyo later in September, where he is the defending champion looking for a title double.