Olympic heartbreak led to record breaking World Cup success: Esha Singh

New Delhi, Jun 2 (PTI) In shooting, medals are often decided by the smallest of margins. What separates winners from the rest is the steely resolve they develop overtime to apply it with their skills in the high pressure environment of a shooting range.

For Esha Singh, that mental battle has shaped what is turning out to be one of the finest phases of her career.

The 21-year-old Indian pistol shooter enjoyed a memorable ISSF World Cup in Munich last week, firing a world-record score of 43 to clinch gold in the women’s 25m pistol before adding a silver medal in the 10m air pistol.

The double podium finish helped India finish atop the medal standings and further cemented her place among the country’s leading shooters.

Yet Esha believes the foundations

of that success were laid not during victory, but in the difficult period that followed the Paris Olympics.

“I had a lot of pressure, obviously, because you don’t really know until the last shot what is going to happen. So I can say that I fought till the very last moment.

“And yeah, I didn’t let loose or become overconfident thinking that I had already secured the medals and that I was good. Nothing like that. I wanted to give my absolute best on that day, and that’s what was going on in my head,” Esha told PTI.

The pressure was evident throughout her Munich campaign. After rewriting the record books in the 25m pistol, she returned to the range two days later and shot 241.2 in the women’s 10m air pistol final to finish second behind compatriot Suruchi Inder Singh’s 242.1. Earlier, both Indians had squeezed into the final with identical qualification scores of 578.

But Esha insists there is no secret formula behind her ability to handle such moments.

“There’s no secret. I’ve been playing for 10 years now. It’s just experience. You just have to accept the feelings and understand that they’re not going to go away. By feelings, I mean pressure.

“Even if you’re a student writing an exam, you’re going to feel that pressure. But you need to remind yourself that the process remains the same. At the end of the day, what you have to do is the same. Nothing else is changing; only the title, the competition, and the names change.” The perspective comes from experience, but more specifically from disappointment.

The Paris Olympics proved to be a turning point for Esha, forcing her to confront failure and emerge stronger from it.

“The Olympics had a lot to do with the way I’ve changed. The phase I went through after the Olympics, especially when you don’t win, is not very pleasant. You go through a lot of emotions and start thinking about every little detail.

“But I’m very grateful for that experience. Even though it wasn’t a nice one, I embraced it, and I feel like it made me much stronger mentally.” Looking back, she believes competing on the sport’s biggest stage fundamentally changed her outlook.

“I felt like that was the highest stage I had reached in my sport. Once you’ve experienced that, everything else feels more manageable. You develop a new grit inside you that pushes you to bounce back even harder.” The lessons from Paris also changed how she views failure.

“You have to remind yourself that you’re not a robot. You can’t give your absolute best every single time.

“As I said, we’re humans, so sometimes things don’t work out. But you have to remind yourself that the effort you put in matters. When it doesn’t happen, it doesn’t happen, and that’s okay.” The renewed mindset has translated into results.

“I feel like that’s one of the reasons I’m having one of the best years of my career. And when it comes to setbacks or periods where you don’t perform well, I look at them the way you look at Lego blocks when you’re a kid. They’re small blocks that build you up.” The success has also come during a period of remarkable strength for Indian women’s pistol shooting. Alongside Olympic medallist Manu Bhaker, Munich gold medallist Suruchi Inder Singh and fellow international Rhythm Sangwan, Esha forms part of a group that has consistently challenged for medals at the highest level. PTI BS BS BS