Emotional Mary Kom feels experience will be biggest strength at Tokyo 2020
The veteran Indian boxer qualified for her second Olympic Games recently and felt her two decades of experience will help her outwit younger rivals.
Indian boxing legend Mary Kom feels her vast experience of boxing at the top level will hold key to her chances at the 2020 Olympics, for which she qualified recently at the Asia Olympic qualifiers.
“Experience allows me to control the pace of bouts. I face a lot of aggressive and fast girls now but what they don’t have is experience and I ensure that it becomes my biggest weapon,” she was quoted saying by the Press Trust of India.
“You can be the fittest and the fastest boxer around, but I will always have the experience to dictate how the bout goes. This is what is going to be my biggest advantage at the Olympics.”
The Indian boxer performed admirably at the Asian boxing Olympic qualifiers in Amman, Jordan; beating Tasmyn Benny and Irish Magno, the latter win giving her the ticket to the 2020 Olympics.
More importantly, both those opponents were 21 and 28 years old respectively, much younger than the 37-year-old Mary Kom, highlighting how her guile helped her get through the challenges.
The strategy did fall short against Chang Yuan in the semi-finals but the veteran Indian boxer's progress through the qualifiers bodes well ahead of the 2020 Olympics.
Mary Kom had made the Indian boxing squad for the Asian boxing Olympic qualifiers after a highly publicised national trial with junior world champion Nikhat Zareen.
The veteran Indian boxer comfortably got past Nikhat Zareen, an opponent 14 years her junior, and then did enough at the qualifiers to have a shot at getting another Olympic medal, hopefully a shinier one than the bronze at London 2012.
Mary Kom set for ‘emotional’ exit at 2020 Olympics
The Indian boxer, who won a medal in her only appearance at the Games at London 2012, will most certainly make her final appearance at the 2020 Olympics, and admitted that it would be an emotional moment but she will keep her focus intact.
“It will be emotional no doubt. There will be lots of pressure as well and it will not be easy to deal with all that. But I will try my best like always. In fact, I will rather just focus on getting the results I want, the emotions can wait for until after that,” she stated.