Blanca Toledano and the most wanted acrobatic jump in Paris

“Our strong point is the technical team, as we have seen in the last two World Cups. But it is clear to us that we need to improve the acrobatics and I think we are on a very good path towards the Games“, account Blanca Toledano. Only a few days left for the Paris Olympic event and the Spanish artistic swimming team Try to smooth out all the details to try to shed light on the three tasks that make up the modality.

This season the team has to intensify its work in a new discipline, the acrobatic work. This, the Olympic in Paris with its traditional technical and freestyle, means extra effort. In 2023, the Spanish strategy chose to postpone the debut in that modality to a large stage until 2024. Spain gained a lot of weight in technical and free exerciseto the point that he became world champion in Fukuoka in that first event and finished fourth in the second.

But in this 2023-2024 campaign it was necessary to develop in acrobatic work to perform another exercise of the guarantees that allow us to dream in Pariswhere all three will weigh heavily in the fight for medals. Spain finished fifth in the Doha World Cup in this modality, where in the calculation of three exercises it is the third. Progression is key in all training, but especially in the new one, when you already have feedback from the judges. “In Qatar we finished with a good feeling because our goal was to postpone the year as much as possible”, said Blanca. “But from then on it was clear to us that we had to improve,” he explained.

Therefore, one of the main focuses of work in the last five months of the road to Paris was to try to make the most of that acrobatic feat. Spain did everything to achieve this. “We have done many video sessions”Toledano said. “We look a lot at what other teams are doing to see what we can improve or improve. It’s a job we do together,” he said. “We went to the French Open to see the different teams live and so we know firsthand which stunts are the hardest,” he said.

Spain has a clear path. “The difficulty is very high, so we tried to raise it as much as possible. When it came to introducing something new, we asked how things were going,” said Blanca. Because there were trials. many. “We tried a lot of different things until we found what we thought could be done. Then, we apply them gradually, with great care,” he said.

Fifth place as a positive starting point

The first results of the Spanish acrobatic exercise can be seen in Doha. The fifth place, far from being a moral blow for the team, turned out to be the opposite. “What we have with our rivals is a recoverable distance. We’ve improved this exercise a lot over the past few months, so I think this could be one of our strong points now,” Blanca warned. “We are a team that usually gives surprises and I think the characteristics of this task are in our favor, so we can give another one,” he said.

For this reason, the Spanish team has increased the intensity of its work in recent weeks. “We already do physical exercises, but now we are more focused on this exercise”Blanca explained. “We use an hour before training for acrobatics. There are seven of them and we have changed quite a lot, but it is turned out very cool,” he promised. “We change elements because we believe we can get more out of them. Fifth place leaves room for improvement. We were satisfied, but we saw the level and realized we had to get down to business,” he said.

This work has required more time in the gym in recent months. “There are many requirements, especially those at the top of the numbers,” Blanca explained. “But those below must be ready to help them. Besides, This is a choreography that requires preliminary work to pass the acrobatics before training. We promoted specific exercises that will help us later on in the water,” he detailed. Physical work is one of the aspects where the national team has had the most influence in recent months.

Of course, Spain, despite marking the acrobatic exercise as one of its great challenges on the road to Paris, has not lost its focus on technical and free routines either. “We tried to give the exercises a twist by increasing the difficulty a little more or changing something the judges told us. Someone came to help us here,” explained Blanca. Because the team took special care all the way to Paris. “In these last weeks, the process is more important than the European itself, for example, though the focus is always to go for it“, said.

In fact, on June 10, Spain was declared the European technical team champion to close the preparation process for the Games in terms of competition. The focus, more than ever, is on Paris. For this reason, the evolution of the Spanish in acrobatic exercise has been carefully done in recent months.. It is key to keep dreaming that the national team’s last jump at the Games is what allows them to get on the podium.