BAKU (Azerbaijan), March 16: Ace Indian gymnast Dipa Karmakar�s hopes of qualifying for the 2020 Tokyo Olympics suffered a jolt after aggravating her knee injury during the vault final at the Artistic Gymnastics World Cup here on Saturday, forcing her to withdraw from next week�s Doha World Cup.
The 25-year-old from Tripura had performed a higher-difficulty Handfront 540 vault, scoring 14.466 and 14.133 points in the two qualifying round for an average of 14.299 to qualify for the vault final at the third position.
But she was left crestfallen after aggravating a knee injury while landing during the first vault final.
�She had some problems in her knee before today�s final. She was feeling some pain yesterday but felt better after working with physio. She attempted the vault finals today but fell on her first vault, aggravating the injury due to undesired landing,� Gymnastic Federation of India (GFI) vice president Riyaz Bhati said.
�She did not attempt the second vault due to the injury and finished her campaign at the Baku World Cup. She will now skip the World Cup in Doha and come back to India for rehabilitation and aim for Asian and World Championships this year.�
The two World Cups are part of an eight-event qualifying system for the 2020 Tokyo Olympics, under which the gymnasts will make the cut based on their top three scores.
The Asian Championship is scheduled to be held in Mongolia from June 13-16, while the World Championship is slated for October 4-13 in Germany later this year.
�Dipa can still qualify by doing well at World Championship this year,� Bhati said.
Dipa had claimed the bronze at the vault event of the Artistic Gymnastics World Cup in Cottbus, Germany, in November last year to fuel her Olympic dream. � PTI
