At 21, she failed all 3 Olympic attempts. At 31, she won her third Commonwealth Games gold. Ankur Warikoo shares an inspiring lesson from Indian wrestler's life

Failure can look final when it happens at the biggest stage. For Indian weightlifter Mirabai Chanu, her Olympic debut in 2016 ended with three failed attempts and a dreaded DNF beside her name. Years later, the same athlete had an Olympic silver medal, a World Championship gold and three consecutive Commonwealth Games titles. Sharing her journey, Ankur Warikoo highlighted how setbacks can become turning points when a person refuses to treat them as the end of the road.

From carrying firewood to the Olympic stage

Ankur Warikoo took to social media and narrated Mirabai Chanu's journey, beginning with her childhood in a small village near Imphal. He recalled how, as a young girl, Chanu could lift more weight than her elder brother while carrying firewood on her head. At the time, however, nobody could have predicted the extraordinary sporting career that lay ahead.

In 2016, at the age of 21, Chanu competed at her first Olympics in Rio de Janeiro. She had three attempts in the competition, but all three were unsuccessful. The scoreboard next to her name read DNF, or Did Not Finish. The setback was devastating enough for Chanu to consider quitting sports.

A year later, everything changed

Instead of allowing that Olympic disappointment to define her career, Chanu returned to competition. At the 2017 World Weightlifting Championships in Anaheim, USA, she won gold in the 48kg category. According to the Olympics website, it made her the first Indian weightlifter in more than two decades to win a World Championship gold, following Karnam Malleswari's title runs in 1994 and 1995.

Her success continued at the 2018 Commonwealth Games, where she won another gold medal. However, a lower-back injury forced her to miss the 2018 Asian Games and World Championships. She spent nearly a year away from competition while recovering.

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Chanu returned at the 2019 World Championships in Thailand. Although she finished fourth, she achieved an important milestone by crossing the 200kg mark for the first time in her career.

Tokyo brought Olympic redemption

Chanu's comeback reached another level in 2021. At the Asian Weightlifting Championships in Tashkent, she set a new world record in the clean and jerk with a 119kg lift, according to the Olympics website.

That performance set the stage for the Tokyo Olympics. Chanu produced a combined lift of 202kg, comprising an 87kg snatch and a 115kg clean and jerk, to win the silver medal. Her Tokyo 2020 silver was only the second Olympic medal won by an Indian weightlifter after Karnam Malleswari. Chanu also became only the second Indian woman after PV Sindhu to win an Olympic silver medal, according to the Olympics website.

Three Commonwealth Games gold medals

Chanu entered the 2022 Commonwealth Games in Birmingham as one of the favourites and lived up to expectations. She won gold in the 49kg category with a total lift of 201kg, including an 88kg snatch and a 113kg clean and jerk. Her performance also broke the previous Commonwealth Games record of 191kg that she had set at the 2018 Gold Coast Games.

Her journey reached another milestone at the 2026 Commonwealth Games in Glasgow. Chanu won India's first gold medal at the Games, dominating the women's 48kg weightlifting event with a record-breaking total of 190kg. She lifted 85kg in the snatch and 105kg in the clean and jerk, setting new Commonwealth Games records in both events. The victory gave the 31-year-old her third consecutive Commonwealth Games gold medal, following her victories in 2018 and 2022.

The lesson Ankur Warikoo drew from her journey

Reflecting on the transformation from Olympic disappointment to repeated international success, Warikoo pointed to the contrast between Chanu's first Olympics and her latest achievement. Eight years after the scoreboard showed Did Not Finish, she was standing on top of the Commonwealth Games podium again.

Warikoo summed up the lesson from her journey by saying that a fall only becomes the end when you accept it as the end.