United World Wrestling (UWW) President Nenad Lalovic said Vinesh Phogat’s disappointment for being disqualified after failing to make the weight on the day of her 50kg gold medal bout at Paris 2024 Olympics was understandable but there was no scope for exception.
Vinesh was disqualified and will be ranked last in Paris after she exceeded the weight-limit by a little over 100 grams during Wednesday’s weigh-in. She was set to face USA’s Sarah Hilderbrandt in the final. The organisers later announced that Cuba’s Yusneylis Guzman Lopez, who lost to the Indian in semifinals, will take her place in the gold medal bout.
“We have to respect the rules. I’m so sad what happened to her. She was overweight, even though by a small margin but rules are rules. The weigh-in is public and all the athletes are there. It’s impossible to let someone to compete who doesn’t make the weight,” said Lalovic.
On being asked whether Vinesh could be allowed to leave with a silver medal since she did make the weight on first day of the competition, Lalovic said, “ It is impossible because the brackets are changing. Everything is changing. And anyway, the rules are rules. Everybody who goes to these competitions knows they have a second weigh-in the next day.”
Could Vinesh have been allowed to compete since the margin by which she missed the cut was only somewhere around 100 grams? “We should be more strict on that because we have a problem that you are living in this moment. The wrestlers are losing too much weight and it’s not good for their health. Many have seen their interest at the moment but they don’t see what happens in 20-30 years. We want athletes to compete in their natural weight. That’s the idea. This is when they make the best performances. Unfortunately, it’s a second case here. We had an Italian wrestler the previous day who didn’t make the weight and she didn’t compete,” said Lalovic.
“If you allow this 100 grams, then you would be allowed for 200 grams. There is no end.”
The weight-cut rule is a bit lenient when it comes to ranking series tournaments. When asked about the same, Lalovic said, ”The reason for that is because this is a preparation period before the big competitions like the Continental or World Championships. There is weight tolerance of 1 or 2kg. But it’s just 1kg. The problem is that you already lost 5kg to have a tolerance of 1kg. That is the problem. Not the 1kg tolerance. 1kg is nothing. But our wrestlers lose, sometimes, 50 percent of their natural weight. And that’s definitely not healthy.”
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