Neeraj Chopra, the reigning champion and star of the Indian javelin throw, admitted that his timing was wrong in the Diamond League Finals, where he came second, but he is optimistic about making progress in the World Championships in Tokyo next month.
In a dominant display in Zurich on Thursday, German thrower Julian Weber raised his first trophy with two throws of 90 meters or more, and the two-time Olympic medallist finished second in the Diamond League Finale for the third consecutive year.
After his initial throw of 84.35 meters, Chopra remained in third place until the fifth round. However, his final throw of 85.01 meters moved him up to second place, surpassing Trinidad and Tobago’s Keshorn Walcott, the gold medallist from the 2012 London Olympics, who finished third with 84.95 meters.
“But I still have three weeks for the World Championships, and I will try my best,” Chopra said after the event on Thursday.
At the Doha Diamond League earlier this year, the Tokyo Olympic gold medallist made his maiden 90-meter throw, but he has often stated that he has to work on his technique to reach the mark consistently.
“This was not too bad. But we are getting very close to the World Championships, so I still need to throw a little bit farther. There were a few things that went well, but still, there were the things which did not go that well,” Chopra said.
“In the last attempt, I still managed to throw 85. But I am very happy for Julian (Weber), he managed to throw really far, and to show 91m was really good. We will see in three weeks.”
“I still need to train a little bit. In this sport, we do not know. It depends on the day.”
Regarding his season’s progress before the World Championships, the silver medallist from the Paris Olympics stated, “It’s going well and today was a hard day. There is always a harder day in sports, so today was a hard day for me, but I still managed in the last (throw) over 85 metres.”
Chopra, who has long struggled with a right groin problem, went on to say that he is in good shape for the track and field championship in Tokyo and that his goal was simply to time his throw precisely.
“I feel good and I just need to find some good timing,” he added.
Weber won first place in the DL Finals on Thursday after throwing his personal best and season-high throw of 91.57 meters on his second try. It was a one-man show in the seven-man field after he started with an effort of 91.37 meters.
Weber’s best attempt of the day was more over six meters ahead of Chopra’s, and none of his competitors could even approach his mark. Following his second throw, the German had fouls of 83.66m, 86.45m, and 88.66m.
Chopra had three legal throws out of six attempts, indicating that he was clearly not playing at his best.
It was a rare occasion for the 27-year-old Indian star, who is known for consistently throwing throws of 88 meters or more, to only reach the 85-meter barrier.
After 2023 and 2024, he finished second for the third time, despite his best efforts to reclaim the trophy he had won in 2022.
Weber’s head-to-head record versus Chopra this season is now 3-1 after Thursday’s victory. The German had previously defeated Chopra to second place in the May Doha DL and the same month at the ORLEN Janusz Kusocinski Memorial event in Chorzow, Poland.
Weber finished second in the June Paris DL, which was won by Chopra.
However, in competitions involving the two since 2016, Chopra has a vast 15-5 head-to-head record advantage against Weber.
Since June 2021, Chopra has not placed lower than second. He qualified for the Finals in Zurich in fourth place with 15 points, despite missing the Silesia and Brussels legs of the DL on August 16 and August 22, respectively.
