Neeraj Chopra missed again, threw javelin away from Olympics in Diamond League, still remained second

Neeraj Chopra sealed his second position in the Lausanne Diamond League by covering a distance of 89.49 meters in his last throw on Thursday. The final throws of Anderson Peters with 90.61 meters and Julian Weber of Germany, who took the best throws of 88.37 meters, sealed the first and third places for their respective countries. This was Neeraj's best preparation so far this season and the second-best ever thrown by him. In Paris, he jumped to a record 89.45 meters.

Till the end of the fourth round of throws, Chopra was in fourth place and he moved into the top three with 85.58m in his fifth throw, enough for him to grab a berth for the Diamond League 2024 final scheduled in Brussels next month. The fourth spot was bagged by Ukraine's Artur Felfner, who had a best throw of 83.38m.

Early at the Paris Olympics, while Chopra could not win the gold, he did create history for India by becoming the second man and third overall to win consecutive medals at the Olympics after wrestler Sushil Kumar, who won bronze and silver at the 2008 and 2012 Olympic Games. The other Indian to achieve this feat is P.V. Sindhu, who has won medals in consecutive Olympics: the silver medal at Rio in 2016 and a bronze at Tokyo in 2020.

That took Chopra to 89.45m in Paris, much better than the 87.58m that fetched him the gold in Tokyo, but it proved not enough against reigning world champion and Diamond League Final winner Arshad Nadeem of Pakistan—a friend and good friend of his. Nadeem outdid him with an Olympic record for gold, winning with a huge throw of 92.97m.