Spain’s medal options at the Eugene World Athletics Championships

The Spanish team, consisting of 56 athletes (the third largest contingent in history, with 34 men and 22 women)will try from this Friday in Eugene (USA) to overcome the loss of its two banners, Orlando Ortega and Ana Peleteiro, to continue to the medal table of the world championships, which were only lost in the London 2017 edition.

The Spanish team returned without metal in 2017 and will make it to Doha 2019but the Spanish’s compelling claim resulted in the awarding of the bronze medal in the 110 m hurdles to Orlando Ortega, who was blocked in Jamaican Omar McLeod’s last race.

The hurdler of Cuban origin did not qualify for Eugene due to injuries and the best Spanish triple jumper of all time, Ana Peleteiro -current Olympic bronze medalist-, has temporarily put aside athletics to become a mother for the first time.

Without the team head, the situation will require a step forward from athletes who in recent times have competed indoors with the greatest responsibilities.

This is the case of María Pérez (second in the ranking of those registered in the 20 km walk), Sara Gallegoof some men who have already stepped on international podiums, such as Álvaro de Arriba, Mariano García or Álvaro Martín, along with classics such as Adel Mechaal, Eusebio Cáceres, Javier Cienfuegos or Marc Tur.

Among them, the representatives of the emerging generation: Asier Martínez, Olympic finalist in the 110 m hurdles, and Mohamed Katirwho in this instance could benefit from the fact that his expectations are not as high as those at the Tokyo 2020 Games.

The greatest options in Spanish, according to statistics, point to the march, the specialty of rarely missing its podium appointment (ten in total, including golds by Valentí Massana and Miguel Ángel López). This time, it’s also the discipline that will deliver the first medals, this Friday, the first day of competition at the University of Oregon’s Hayward Field.

López, 20 km world champion in Beijing 2015 and bronze in Moscow 2013, is the only active world medalist. of the team, and goes on to the national team (this is his sixth World Cup), but this time was called up at a distance of 35 km. Below, María Pérez and Álvaro Martín, two European champions, will start with podium hopes.

In the official entry list released by World Athletics, five Spaniards are emerging as finalists (8 first), they are all walkers and the women’s 4×100 meter relay. best placed, María Pérez (second) and Miguel Ángel López, fourth and first non-Japanese on the list.

The Spanish team’s call sparked a controversy that the covid, indirectly, had come to resolve. Catalan Adel Mechaal entered at 1,500 and 5,000and Ignacio Fontes, from Granada, who finished third in the final of the first distance of the Spanish championships in Nerja (just ahead of Mechaal), were left on the list.

Criticism of Fontes himself, of his coach and other athletes who sympathized with his goal, subsided due to an unexpected incident. Mechaal tested positive on covid and the Spanish Federation kept him in the 5,000 test, which he played well in the championship, but Fontes replaced him in the 1,500, which was closer to the program.

Mechaal, who almost didn’t win the medal in London 2017, will return to Eugene, though the extent of his physical recovery was not known on the eve of the tournament.

One of the Spanish middle-distance runners, Mario García Romo from Salamanca, new Spanish champion of 1,500, knows the stadium well, where he was second recently in the NCAA. His debut with the Spanish team will be in style, at several world championships.

Fontes himself, who competed in the last Prefontaine Memorial), is also familiar with the track, as well as the Under-20 World Cup survivors who played here in 2014: Carlos Mayo, Diego Garcia Carrera, Fatima Diame, Laura Garcia-Caro and Maria Perezaccording to federal statistician Miguel Villaseñor.

The first to shoot, on Friday in hammer qualifier, will be Extremaduran Javier Cienfuegos, the athlete with the team’s most international performances (39), who has already been seen in an Olympic final and elsewhere.