"Disheartening for sure, very disheartening. But it is what it is today. Somewhere, I believe in luck. It was not my day," these were the words of a disappointed but resolute Arjun Babuta who missed out on a bronze medal by the barest of margins in the 10m air rifle event on Monday at the Paris Olympics.
Arjun started off strongly and recorded scores above 10 in his first 10 attempts. But a shot of 9.5 in the dying stages of the event ruled him out of medal contention. Reflecting on what transpired, Arjun mentioned that as an athlete you can only control the controllable and things are not going to fall in place for you if it's not "meant to be".
"No matter how hard you try, even if you put 100%, you can't just say that you are gonna win today. Of course, you can go for it and you have to try your best," Arjun told reporters after the end of his event on Monday.
"Definitely, I am proud. My preparation leading into the event really worked for me. All the years of hard work, the technique and the tactics that I had zeroes down with my coaches worked during the event. We can pinpoint on a shot that could have turned the outcome in my favour but it wasn't meant to be."
Arjun also expressed his gratitude to former shooter and Olympics gold medallist Abhinav Bindra for his support in the lead-up to his event and afterwards. Arjun revealed that Abhinav lauded him for his display in the event and urged him to not dwell on the loss much.
"He was proud to see me shoot like that. He said that it (failure) is tough to deal with and I have to just accept it and move on and it will help me in the future and it will make me stronger for sure," Arjun added.
The 25-year-old also admitted that participation in the Olympics brings a lot of pressure with itself as it is the biggest sporting spectacle and there are a lot of expectations to deal with.
"The Olympics put a lot of pressure on athletes as it comes one in four years. There are a lot of expectations to deal with and there are a lot of eyes on you. There is a lot of pressure that comes with participating in the Olympics," he concluded.
