The Olympic gold medallist tweeted the photos along with the message, “Returned to training this week with the same hunger and desire as before. A #throwback to the beginning of the last Olympic cycle is a good place to start! Thank you to everyone for your messages of support.”

Returned to training this week with the same hunger and desire as before. A #throwback to the beginning of the last Olympic cycle is a good place to start! Thank you to everyone for your messages of support. 🙏🏻 pic.twitter.com/gia4fP4SQD

— Neeraj Chopra (@Neeraj_chopra1) October 20, 2021

More than half a century after Milkha Singh looked back for a fraction of a second and 37 years after PT Usha forgot to dip at the finish line resulting in heart-breaking fourth-place finishes, the glorious flight of Neeraj Chopra’s javelin gave the country its first-ever track and field medal, a gold in Tokyo 2020.

The Haryana boy did not just win a gold medal, flinging the javelin a staggering 87.58m to top the charts in Tokyo, but vaulted himself into history books. The gold, a historic first for the country in track and field, the second for an individual ever and the first since Abhinav Bindra’s in 2008, would also ensure India’s richest-ever tally.

Such has been the impact of Neeraj’s success that popular sports academies, like the Chhatrasal Stadium in Delhi, are clocking a rush of new enrollments. An Olympian says he is getting “at least half-a-dozen text messages every day” from beginners asking about coaches. And retailers are shipping in more equipment. Neeraj Chopra’s historic gold at the Tokyo Olympics in August has triggered a javelin surge at the grassroots.