Arshad Nadeem won the men's Olympic javelin title in Paris on Thursday, beating defending champion Neeraj Chopra of India to secure Pakistan's first individual medal at a Summer Games.
Standing at almost two metres tall, Nadeem made the country proud by throwing the javelin 92.97 metres, improving the Olympic record by more than 2.50 metres and prompting a standing ovation from the packed stadium.
“When I threw the javelin, I felt it coming out of my hand and I felt like it could be an Olympic record,” said Nadeem, 27.
Before Arshad's remarkable victory, Pakistan had never won an individual gold medal at the Olympics.
Pakistan's previous three gold medals were in field hockey: its team won gold in 1960, 1968 and 1984.
Before Thursday, only two Pakistani athletes had won individual medals of any colour: a bronze in wrestling in 1960 and a bronze in boxing in 1988.
Since the 1992 Barcelona Games, Pakistan has not won a single medal of any kind.
But while the nation is in jubilation, some people on social media are claiming that Nadeem has broken a 118-year-old record. Well, that is not true.
In a post on X, sports journalist Faizan Lakhani wondered how the javelin thrower could break such a record.
“The previous record for the best throw at the Olympic Games was held by Norway’s Andreas Thorkildsen. He achieved it at the 2008 Beijing Olympics. That’s 16 years ago,” he said.
Lakhani said the javelin throw was not even in the Olympics 118 years ago. It was first included in 1908.
On its website, the Olympics also mention: “The javelin throw has been part of the Olympic Games since 1908 as a men’s event. The women’s competition was added in 1932.”
If we were to do the math, the claimed record would have taken place in 1906, a year in which the javelin throw was not even part of the Olympic Games.
In his post, Lakhani added: “Records progress one after another, so when a record is broken, the duration is calculated from the previous record.”
Arshad Nadeem's records in the Olympic final
- Pakistan's first individual gold medal at the Olympic Games.
- Pakistan's first medal in athletics at the Olympic Games,
- First Olympic gold in any discipline in the last 40 years for Pakistan.
- Sets a new Olympic record for the longest throw of 92.97 m
