Spain will seek its fifth mountain bike medal at the Paris Olympic Games

Only two months left for the circuit of Olympic Games in Paris will host a mountain bike race, on Sunday the 28th the women’s race and on Monday the 29th the men’s race. At first Spain It has no representative and in the men’s competition the national team can field two cyclists, who will come from the candidates. David Valero, Jofre Cullell and David Campoyes. It was a difficult decision for him national MTB coach Mikel Zabalathat soon, probably next week, will announce which two bikers will be chosen.

For a coach this decision is always controversial. Not because of the decision itself, but because of everything behind it, the specific interests of the athletes themselves and the teams that pay them their salaries, who also want to be represented in the greatest sporting event in the world. But Michael Zabala, a man with experience in these matters, remains calm. “Zero pressure, I have to do what I have to do and my wrist doesn’t have to tremble. We have two places and I trust that the selected cyclists will do well,” explained the national MTB coach in MD. And he added, “every time you make a call it’s complicated. What I did for the Paris Games was to talk to the Pre-Olympic runners, to explain to them what criteria I would base my decision on. The criteria it was made public on the RFEC website and today we are talking about two tests of. Brazil World Cupthe recent one Czech Republic and the European“.

Michael Zabala He had just come from the Parisian Olympic mountain bike circuit, where the runners, together with the RFEC staff, tested different materials, be it tires or types of bikes. “At the circuit level, the one in Paris was not bad, but we liked the one in Tokyo better, it was more difficult. The more difficult, the better for Valero. The one in Paris is more technical, a circuit in which “You have to run the bike, have a good rhythm and have flow on the banks; but in the end, if you’re good, you’re good.”

There are three options that Zabala, the Granada native from Baza, has on the table David Valero (BH Coloma Team)the Catalan of Santa Coloma de Farners Jofre Cullell (BH Coloma Team)and Veléz Rubio from Almería David Domingo (Orbea Factory Team). Right now, the best ranking is held by Jofre Cullell (25th), ahead of David Valero (29th) and David Domingo (70th).

THE OLD MEDALS

Sydney 2000: Marga Fullana (bronze)
Athens 2004: José Antonio Hermida (silver)
Rio 2016: Carlos Coloma (bronze)
​Tokyo 2020: David Valero (bronze)

Regardless of Mikel Zabala’s election, the medal options seem complicated, based on the latest results, but the national coach is not losing hope. “I see that the medal is complicated, but what happens is that the Games are a specific race. The starting grid is cleaner and this detail penalizes us less and works in favor of Valero and the pressure of the Games itself always brings surprises with people performing beyond what is expected of them and vice versa.

For the third time in MTB Olympic history, Spain will not participate Paris women’s test representation in XCO by some Olympic Games, the last one is Rocío del Alba at Tokyo 2020.”Dawn Dew He hasn’t been there yet and the others have ups and downs. The conditions have not yet been met, but I would like to highlight, for example, the green shoot that represents Martha Cano (19 years)”.