On Saturday, weightlifter Mirabai Chanu scored a podium finish in the women's 49kg division at the upcoming Tokyo Olympics, giving India its first medal, a silver. Chanu's best snatch lift was 87 kilogrammes, and the Indian weightlifter won silver in the clean and jerk with a lift of 115 kg. The 26-year-old lifted a total of 202 kg to put the Rio Olympics behind her, where she failed to execute a single respectable lift in the clean and jerk event. Karnam Malleswari had earned a bronze medal in weightlifting in the Sydney Olympics in 2000, and this was India's second medal in the sport.
The 26-year-old Manipuri athlete was introduced to weightlifting by chance. Mirabai intended to join in archery when she was 12 years old, but the enclosure was closed, so she peered into the weightlifting hall at Khuman Lampak Stadium and fell in love. Mirabai would travel 20 kilometres daily for the next four years between her home in the village of Nongpok Kakching and Imphal for her lessons.
In 2009, she earned her first big medal, a gold in the Youth Championships in Chhattisgarh, barely one year after starting training. Within five years, she was lifting a total of 170 kg, good enough for a silver medal in the 2014 Commonwealth Games in Glasgow. That year, she began working with her current coach, Vijay Sharma, and by 2016, she had broken Kunjarani Devi's 12-year-old record of 190 kg.
Mirabai attributes her success to years of hauling firewood up and down hills on her head. Mirabai has received numerous awards in the last five years. In 2017, she became the first Indian woman to win a gold medal at the World Weightlifting Championships since Karnam Malleswari in 1994, proving herself to a world that had written her off.
She, too, had her lows. Despite qualifying for the 2016 Rio Olympics, Mirabai was unable to compete. Her clean and jerk performance in Rio was abysmal, with three "no lifts" following an 82kg effort in snatch. Mirabai was robbed of nearly a year due to severe back discomfort, but she fought back.
