How to produce ‘Champions’ in sports

India, a country with more than one billion population, has achieved limited success at the international sporting arena, especially in the Olympic Games. Since 1900, when India participated in the Olympics for the first time with a lone athlete Norman Pritchard, the country has won only nine Gold medals, six Silver Medals and eleven Bronze Medals. These figures clearly represent that the country is yet to emerge as a superpower in the global sporting map.

Table 1 represents the medals won by India in various Summer Olympic Games.

Table 1: Medals won by Indian athletes/teams in Summer Olympic Games

Discipline	Gold	Silver	Bronze	Total
Hockey	8	1	2	11
Shooting	1	2	1	4
Athletics	0	2	0	2
Wrestling	0	1	3	4
Boxing	0	0	2	2
Tennis	0	0	1	1
Weightlifting	0	0	1	1
Badminton	0	0	1	1

Table 2 represents the medals won by the Individual athletes in various disciplines in the Summer Olympic Games.

Table 2: Performance of Indian Athletes in Individual Events in Summer Olympics

Olympic Games	Discipline	Athlete	Medal
1952 Helsinki	Wrestling	K.D. Jadhav	Bronze
1996 Atlanta	Tennis	Leander Peas	Bronze
2000 Sydney	Weightlifting	K. Malleswari	Bronze
2004 Athens	Shooting	R.S. Rathore	Silver
2008 Beijing	Shooting	Abhinav Bindra	Gold
	Wrestling	Sushil Kumar	Bronze
	Boxing	Vijender Kumar	Bronze
2012 London	Shooting	Vijay Kumar	Silver
	Wrestling	Sushil Kumar	Silver
	Shooting	Gagan Narang	Bronze
	Badminton	Saina Nehwal	Bronze
	Boxing	Mary Kom	Bronze
	Wrestling	Yogeshwar Dutt	Bronze

Significant improvement can be observed in the performance of the Indian athletes in the London Olympic Games held in 2012. However, India’s position was 55^th in the medal tally.

For the overall development of sports in any country, the three sectors of sports should work together. The public sector, private sector and the non-profit sector should cooperate with each other to achieve the objective of producing athletes of international repute.

The objective of this article is to discuss briefly the approach that may be adopted for producing elite athletes for the purpose of winning medals at the international stage.

What makes ‘Champions’ in Sports? 

A scheme- based, long-term, multi- dimensional approach is required for producing ‘Champions’ in sports. Factors, that play important roles in this process, are explained below:

i)                    Facilities: Facilities include both high- quality infrastructure and equipment for training the athletes. Building stadiums and academies of global standard and making provisions for high quality sports equipments and scientific laboratories are essential for producing Champions in sports.  

ii)           Coaching Programmes: These programmes are aimed at producing elite-level coaches who will be given the responsibility to prepare athletes for international competitions.

iii)      Technology: Modern technology is used to measure and analyze time, motion, force, movements, muscle activities etc. This analysis helps an athlete to improve performance.

iv)             Psychological Analysis: Psychological analysis helps an athlete in deciding goals, making strategies, maintaining motivation, managing distractions, inculcating teamwork etc which are important to achieve excellence in the international arena of sports.

v)                  Physiological Analysis: This is a multi- dimensional analysis to identify the strengths and weaknesses of an athlete. This analysis plays a crucial role in improving fitness, reducing the possibilities of injuries, reducing the period of recovery etc.

vi)       Sports Medicine: A comprehensive programme on sports medicine helps an athlete to achieve sustained excellence in international sports by improving fitness, treating and preventing injuries, undertaking proper recovery and rehabilitation etc. It gives an athlete necessary guidance against ‘Doping’.

vii)              Nutrition: An understanding of nutrition helps an athlete to follow a proper diet which is essential for preparing for an international event. 

The above discussion shows the importance of a Long Term Development Plan for producing Champions in sports. The Sports Federations are responsible in making and executing this holistic plan while the Government and the corporate sector should extend their institutional and financial support for the successful execution of this plan. 

An improvement in the performance of the Indian athletes can be observed in London Olympics and in other events including the Delhi Commonwealth Games 2010 in which India won 38 Gold Medals, 27 Silver Medals and 36 Bronze Medals. However, the expectation is more. We may hope that the governments and the federations will work together to establish India in the global sporting map.