When fencer Josna Christy Jose made her Senior National debut in Raipur in January 2017, her mind was free. Nobody expected anything from her.
Surprisingly, the 19-year-old entered the sabre final where she shocked international Bhavani Devi in a tight final and won the National gold on her first try.
“I don’t think she lost because I was a very good fencer then, she may have played it easy since I was just a beginner and then it was probably difficult for her to come back,” said Josna in a chat with The Hindu on the sidelines of the sub-junior Nationals at the Regional Sports Centre here.
But while Bhavani’s graph rose steadily — she won the Commonwealth championship gold and became the first Indian fencer to qualify for the Olympics in Tokyo two years ago — Josna did not hit it big time though she won silver, behind the famed fencer, in four Nationals after that.
“After my gold, we had a camp in Pune, went for the Asian championship but there was no major turning points or changes in my fencing life then,” said the young woman from Wayanad who trains under National sabre coach Sagar Lagu at the SAI, Thalassery.
She feels that if she had received international training at that stage, things could have been different.
“However much we train, we need quality competitions to do well, the more we get the better we can be.”
Josna was a part of the Indian women’s sabre team that won the Commonwealth championship bronze in London last year and she also competed in World Cups in Georgia and Tunisia in 2022.
“I haven’t had foreign training at all. We have a few fencers training abroad now but we need to send a bigger group, and in groups for training, to assess and help out each other,” she said.
