Indian wrestler Vinesh Phogat was disqualified from the gold medal bout of the women’s 50kg category at the Paris Olympics after failing her second weigh in on Wednesday.
Vinesh has struggled with cutting weight particularly for lower weight categories. Sources from her team revealed that the camp raced against time to help her make the hard 50kg limit in place in the Olympics, but fell short by a little over 100gm.
Here’s how the weight restictions work in the Olympics and how it’s different from other UWW or international tournaments:
WEIGH-IN SPECIFICS:
Weigh-ins take place in the morning for any wrestlers competing that day. The tournament for each weight class will be contested over a two-day span, so any wrestlers that make the finals or the repechage will have to make weight on both days.
During the first weigh-in, wrestlers will have 30 minutes to make weight. They have the right to get on the scale as many times as they wish. Contestants are weighed with their singlets, but nothing else. Athletes will also be examined to make sure they have no signs of any contagious disease and that their fingernails are cut very short.
For any wrestlers competing on the second day, the weigh-in will last 15 minutes. This is a non-negotiable window during which the wrestler must make the required weight or risk disqualification.
According to the UWW, the medical control and a first weigh-in will be held the morning of the concerned weight category. The qualified athletes for the finals and repechages will be weigh-in again the second morning of the concerned weight category. No more weight tolerance will be allowed for the second weigh-in.
Two kilograms weight tolerance is allowed for World Cup and for the International Tournaments (Except UWW Ranking Events).
The Olympics follow a strict weight restriction without the 2kg weigh in tolerance.
ALSO READ | Vinesh Phogat disqualified, Cuban wrestler Guzman Lopez named replacement for 50kg final
WHEN DID WRESTLING SWITCH FROM A SINGLE-DAY TO TWO-DAY EVENT AND WHY?
As a means to curb doping, the UWW brought out a string of changes to the competition format in late 2017, which came into effect in major tournaments including the World Championships in 2018.
Among them was the switch from one-day to two-day format. The Rio Olympics was the last time we saw wrestling conducted as a single day event in a major international tournament.
The order also said that weigh-ins would happen twice, one before the preliminary rounds on day one and the other before the repechage and medal rounds on day two. These would happen closer to the bout to better screen for doping.
For tournaments other than the Olympics, the 2kg allowance was also given in this same order.
How do wrestlers cut weight?
Most sports with weight categories involve this concept of cutting weight. Athletes try to fit into a lower weight category and so they have to cut or reduce weight which in most cases is up to 10 per cent of their body mass, in the run-up to major events.
The challenging part of this comes 24-48 hours before a bout. The weight that needs to be reduced often comes down to the smallest of margins, making it that much harder.
Once the weight is made and the weigh in is done, athletes usually hydrate and eat in order to gain energy for the actual sporting event. This involves recovering fluids and the body mass lost. Once the competition ends, the cycle of cutting weight down begins again.
For wrestlers, who have two weigh ins, this is particularly challenging as body mass has to be built for strength and then slashed down to make the cut drastically in short periods of time.
The challenge comes from the fact that athletes any way have body fat levels in single digits and have little to no fat to lose.
For wrestlers that often involves eating little to nothing too sometimes.
When body fat is slashed, the only other thing to control if body water levels. As Dr. Dinshaw Pardiwala, the chief team doctor for the Indian contingent in Paris, explains, this can be done through making the body sweat. Sauna and exercise are two ways to achieve that.
Wrestlers often wear thick jackets and train. Vinesh did too. Water almost ceases to be consumed.
Lack of water and dehydrating the body comes with its issues. Motor issues, lack of concentration, dizziness, temperament issues are some of the problems. Long term issues involve kidney struggles as well.
The extreme weight cut also impacts sleep patterns of athletes.
How extreme the cut is depends on how drastically low the athlete is going from their normal weight range. For Vinesh, her normal weight range is 57, which is why the 50kg cut is so challenging.
In her case, due to the extreme weight cut, her body went into siege mode i.e refused to give up any more water. It resulted in bare margins. An approximately 100gm difference to the weight she needed. A 100gm weight difference which cost her a medal heavier than that.
For women athletes, hormonal changes can occur. Sometimes even death can occur. In 1997, three USA collegiate wrestlers made national headlines, dying from the same cause - weight cutting within 33 days of each other. In all three cases, the students experienced dehydration resulting in hypothermia after they layered on clothes and did endless workouts in heated rooms. Unfortunately, they out-worked their bodies. The perspiration they produced cooled them to the point of hypothermia resulting in heart attacks and kidney failure, all common effects of extreme weight cutting.
All of this is besides what weakness and exhaustion can do to your propensity to pick up injuries.
Has this failure to cut weight happened to Vinesh before?
Yes. Vinesh failed to make weight in the Asian Qualifiers ahead of the 2016 Rio Olympics. Back then, she competed in the 48kg category and could not drop a kilo of water weight.
How did the weight cut issue pan out in Vinesh Phogat’s case in Paris?
Hours after Vinesh Phogat’s disqualification from the 50kg wrestling final due to a failed weigh-in on Wednesday morning, a member of her camp revealed the distressing details of her weight-cutting ordeal. “Her normal weight is 57kg, and she did everything to get down to 50kg,” the member said. “She was 49.9kg yesterday (Tuesday) morning, but the moment she had even a small meal, her weight bounced back to at least 53kg. She had to reach this weight to have the strength to fight in three bouts.”
“After the semifinals last night, her weight was 52.7kg. She didn’t sleep even a minute, didn’t drink a sip of water, and didn’t have a morsel of food. She spent the entire night running and using the sauna. She made it to 50.1kg but didn’t have time to cut the last 100 grams. There was no leeway and no extra time to make weight.”
Why does Vinesh lose her medal if she won the semifinal after making the right weight?
According to Article 11 of the United World Wrestling’s rule book, an athlete who fails to make the weight cut will be eliminated from the event. “If an athlete does not attend or fails the weigh-in (the 1st or the 2nd weigh-in), he will be eliminated from the competition and ranked last, without rank.”
The last clause there, without rank, strips her of the triumphs she amassed en route to the final.
Cuba’s Yusneylis Guzman Lopez, who lost to Vinesh in the 50kg women’s freestyle wrestling semifinals, has been named as the Indian’s replacement for the gold medal bout.
“Vinesh failed second day weigh-in. According to the arcticle 11 of the International Wrestling Rules, Vinesh will be replaced by the wrestler who lost against her in the Semifinal. Therefore Yusneylis Guzman Lopez (Cuba) will compete in the Final,” said the organisers in an official statement.
The statement further mentioned that the repechage bout between the top-seeded Japanese wrestler Yui Susaki, who lost her first-ever international bout to Vinesh in the opening round, and Ukraine’s Oksana Livach, who suffered a 5-7 defeat against the Indian in the quarterfinals, will now be a bronze medal match.
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