A Look at London 2012 and the Impact of Olympic Gold Quest

Wednesday August 15, 2012 , 3 min Read

As the dust settles on a hugely entertaining and successful London Olympics, and as we still come to terms with the astonishing performances of a certain Usain Bolt, let’s take a closer look at how Indians performed at the Games.

It was once again a story of so-near-yet-so-far for a number of Indian athletes, as familiar names like Leander Paes, Sania Mirza and Devendro Singh lost out in the quarters.

As far as medal victories went, this was India’s highest tally at the Olympics. The six medals (two silvers and four bronze) so far, have overshadowed the tallies of previous years despite Abhinav Bindra’s gold winning performance in Beijing not being matched.

That being said, it’s interesting to note that four out of six the medal winners received training and support from Olympic Gold Quest, a non-profit organisation founded by eminent Indian sporting names like Geet Sethi and Prakash Padukone. In an earlier, pre-olympic interview, there was hope and confidence exuded that the Indian contingent would perform well at the Olympics.

Medal Winners from India at the London 2012 Olympics are:

Saina Nehwal( Bronze medallist and supported by OGQ): The shuttler from Hyderabad won a bronze in the highly competitive field of women’s Badminton, and at 22 looks like she has better performances in store.

Gagan Narang(Bronze medallist supported by OGQ): Although a little less popular than his estimated colleague Bindra, it wasn’t exactly a surprise to see the veteran bagging India’s first medal.

Mary Kom(Bronze medallist supported by OGQ): One of India’s biggest medal hopes, the five time women’s world boxing champ lived up to her and the country’s medal expectations.

Vijay Kumar(Silver medallist supported by OGQ): A surprise package, but the country’s best performer nonetheless, the Army man finished second best in the 25m rapid fire pistol event.

Yogeshwar Dutt(Bronze medallist): Another surprising winner, the former Asian wrestling champion’s efforts ensured another bronze for India in the men’s freestyle 60kg.

Sushil Kumar(Silver medalist): The bronze medallist from Beijing went one better to win the silver at London 2012.

Although there is the disappointment of not having won a gold medal, it would be an understatement to say that OGQ has been instrumental in India’s medal tally so far. Bearing in mind the fact that the organisation only took off four years ago, and have already started grooming youngsters for the Olympics in Brazil 2016, this performance should be seen as the stepping stone for what can be achieved in four years time.

“To make this happen(a successful Olympics 2016), OGQ now plans on gradually implementing a well-structured Junior program for talented athletes in the age group of 11-18 years,” quotes Vaibhav Tandon, head of the research and analytics wing at OGQ.

We at Yourstory congratulate OGQ, the medal winners and the one’s who missed out and wish them all the best in planning for the games’ future editions.

Visit the OGQ site here.