Vinesh Phogat Makes Retirement U-turn, Aims for 2028 LA Olympics

Delhi: In a major update, Wrestler Vinesh Phogat has made an announcement related to her comeback. Interestingly, she made a retirement U-turn. She took to her social media handle to announce the same.

What Vinesh wrote in her X post?

In her X post, Vinesh wrote, "People kept asking if Paris was the end. For a long time, I didn't have the answer. I needed to step away from the mat, from the pressure, from the expectations, even from my own ambitions. For the first time in years, I allowed myself to breathe. I took time to understand the weight of my journey the highs, the heartbreaks, the sacrifices, the versions of me the world never saw. And somewhere in that reflection, I found the truth, I still love this sport.''

She further added, "I still want to compete. In that silence, I found something I'd forgotten 'the fire never left'. It was only buried under exhaustion and noise. The discipline, the routine, the fight... it's in my system. No matter how far I walked away, a part of me stayed on the mat. So here I am, stepping back toward LA28 with a heart that's unafraid and a spirit that refuses to bow. And this time, I'm not walking alone my son is joining my team, my biggest motivation, my little cheerleader on this road to the LA Olympics." 

Here's Vinesh Phogat's X post:

It is to be noted here that Vinesh Phogat, who is India’s Asian Games gold medallist, made history by becoming the first Indian woman wrestler to reach an Olympic gold medal bout. 

During the Olympics, Vinesh Phogat had a difficult journey. During the quarterfinals of her debut Games in 2016, Vinesh suffered a knee injury which led her to withdraw. Meanwhile, in 2021, she entered the Tokyo Olympics, but was later knocked out in the quarterfinals.