Watching the Olympics this past weekend has been equal parts exhilarating and depressing. Seeing the American men win the 4 x 100 m swimming relay last night was un-freaking-real! But it also sent me in to full, early mid-life crisis mode. Am I the only one? I kept thinking how I’m now too old and beat-up to be an Olympian and I was feeling kind of jealous of fellow Wolverine Michael Phelps (would my upper body look like that if I growled in victory poolside?). And then this morning my depression lifted some. Even though I woke to the upsetting news that American Badminton stud Raju Rai had lost to a Finn (read here to understand how hard the environment is), I was quickly informed that Abhinav Bindra of India won the Gold in the 10m Air Rifle! It was Bindra that turned out to be the great brown hope.

So how did Abhinav help me to avert my midlife crisis until another day? Just look at our boy. He looks like and ordinary IT guy or an engineer or friendly grad student. He is now a national hero. A Peter Parker of sorts. He is the great common brown guy hope! Not all of us can have Phelps upper body, but some of us can imagine looking like this (I like paintballing for instance ).

From a virtual non-entity to the country’s hottest property overnight, Abhinav Bindra has struck gold. Not just in Olympics. The Chandigarh shooter who picked up India’s first ever individual gold in Olympics is expected to see his brand value shooting up to a couple of crores, riding not only on his historic feat but also his youthful personality. [Link]

Oh, lighten-up you nationalists! I’m just joking around. A hearty congrats to Abhinav! The dude even has over a 1000 comments on his latest blog entry. A feat unmatched by even…me. Well at least I can go after that record.

And for every hero of the day there is the sad story of the day. Poor Sania. Pulled out because her wrist was hurting. That’s what cortisone injections are for woman!

Raj Bhavsar lives on!!!

Update: Raj sports the bronze. Awesome.