India's ace wrestler Vinesh Phogat, who announced her retirement hours after her disqualification from the Paris Olympics 2024, has reversed her decision to retire and announced that she would return to the mat as she set her sights on the 2028 Los Angeles Olympics.
Vinesh took to social media on Friday to announce her decision that "I still want to compete" with a heart "that's unafraid and a spirit that refuses to bow." "People kept asking if Paris was the end. For a long time, I didn't have the answer. I needed to step away from the mat, from the pressure, from the expectations, even from my own ambitions," Vinesh said in a statement.
"For the first time in years, I allowed myself to breathe. I took time to understand the weight of my journey: the highs, the heartbreaks, the sacrifices, the versions of me the world never saw. And somewhere in that reflection, I found the truth, I still love this sport.
I still want to compete. "In that silence, I found something I'd forgotten: 'the fire never left'. It was only buried under exhaustion and noise. The discipline, the routine, the fight... it's in my system. No matter how far I walked away, a part of me stayed on the mat.
"So here I am, stepping back toward LA28 with a heart that's unafraid and a spirit that refuses to bow. And this time, I'm not walking alone; my son is joining my team, my biggest motivation, my little cheerleader on this road to the LA Olympics." Vinesh made history in Paris by becoming the first Indian woman wrestler to reach the final at the Olympics.
Her landmark run included a stunning win over Japan’s four-time world champion Yui Susaki. But her redemption story, following a disappointing performance in the Tokyo Olympics, ended in heartbreak as she was disqualified from the competition after she was found overweight in the second weigh-in on the morning of the final.
However, she appealed against her Olympic disqualification with the Court of Arbitration for Sports (CAS) and demanded a joint silver medal in the 50kg weight category. But, the Ad-Hoc Division of the CAS dismissed Vinesh's petition against her disqualification, shattering her dream of clinching her maiden Olympic medal.
Later, Vinesh along with Bajrang Punia, joined the Congress in the run-up to the 2024 Haryana Assembly elections, where she won from the Julana constituency in Jind, defeating the BJP’s Yogesh Bajrangi.