Eusebio Cáceres ends his long jump competition frustrated (only two valid jumps with the wind in his favor and the annoying rain, and the cold, the fifth and the sixth, and only 7.77m the longest), he sits in the first row of the stands, in front of the jumping hall, and asks Iván Pedroso, his coach, to give him a demonstration of how he has to raise his knee in the jump, how he has to step, a good stomp, without trembling, to propel himself And fly. And Cáceres, the best Spanish jumper, gazes enthralled at the jumper’s master who has insisted on making the 32-year-old from Alicante from Onil become great again. “I love when he gives me practical lessons, he makes it so easy, he does it so well…”, sighs Cáceres. “I started very well, with a very long null, and doing what I had to do, without stopping before beating so as not to lose speed, without thinking, mechanically… But later, I went back to being the same as before and when I was launched by In the hallway my head told me that I wasn’t going to reach the board, and I reached out and passed me. At least I feel angry again, to want to fight with my rivals.”
Cáceres arrived with more hopes for its outdoor debut. He arrived almost convinced that he was capable of jumping well again, and so was Pedroso, who the day before was reflecting on their relationship, which began in April of last year when, after a winter having fun in the combined events in his Onil, he called the Cuban and told him that he wanted to make a change in his life, to train him with his group in Guadalajara, please. “When you have been doing the same thing for many years, changing things is a little more difficult. Eusebio came to Guadalajara a little stronger, more muscular on top,” says Pedroso. “And he cost me a little bit. He cost me. I got to talk a lot with him. I know you’re fast. I know you enter at a very high speed, but I need a small change so that I can make entry easier for you and accelerate more without wearing you out as much. So. Things like that, little by little, I was telling him, I was telling him, I was doing it, it cost him, it cost him a lot, but now he is in another phase, in a very good phase.”
The lessons learned in the hard afternoon of the Canarias Athletics Invitational rally can be put into practice by Cáceres, fourth in the last Olympic Games, next week at the Castellón rally, where everyone improves their marks. “Castellón is the Spanish Doha,” says Pedroso. “It is always very good humid heat and the wind always blows just in favor.”
“How cold!”, Iván Pedroso shivered on the sidelines, the night already fallen but not the wind. He has managed to borrow a fleece and curses the bad luck he always encounters in Tenerife. The day before sun and heat, the day of the rally, the sunset, freezing. Due to the slowness of the electronic measurement system, so weak, the men’s length competition is extended and the women’s triple, the star event, is delayed until sunset. Under the spotlight, in the wind, Peleteiro, out of temper, is not found. Neither do the rivals. After the third jump, the Galician, who wins with 13.82m, decides not to jump anymore. “I did it so as not to put my body in danger,” explains Peleteiro, acclaimed despite everything by the chicharrera kids, on the way to anti-doping control. She, and Pedroso, her coach, will always have Castellón.
It was a somewhat disappointing afternoon, and not only for Cáceres and Peleteiro. It was explained by Jesús David Delgado, a local hurdler who trains in Barcelona with Álex Codina, who won the 400m hurdles with 50.50s, just a week after achieving his best time in Soria, 49.34s: “The track is which is, we all know how windy it is. “We have fought against it and we have survived.” Javier Mirón, winner of the 800m (1m 48.23s), also barely survived it, but not Bruno Hortelano. The national record holder in all sprints, from 100m to 400m, was making his season debut. With +3.5 meters per second of wind, in favor on the straight, sideways almost in front of the curve, Hortelano was only sixth with a not very brilliant 21.41s in a race won by the young Swiss Timothé Mumenthaler (20 ,68s). The brand did not stop his optimism and his smile at all. “I have started my Olympic season in the best place,” he said. “The warmth of the public has overcome the cold of the atmosphere.”
It blew from the north, from the Atlantic, 29 kilometers per hour, and entered from all sides of a stadium with a single stand, dislocated the tapes that indicated their intensity to jumpers and fiercely shook the nets of the discus throwing cage. They were the perfect conditions for a great brand, but, perhaps because of the rain that fell from time to time, not very intense but sticky, perhaps because of the atmospheric pressure, the disc of Daniel Stahl, the Olympic champion, the great figure of the meeting, he did not find a good plane to fly. The Swede’s best throw was 68.99m, which is not bad at all, but he didn’t even reach 70 meters, the line of the best, he didn’t even beat the Tíncer track record, which is still 69.50 meters with which local Mario Pestano set a national record in 2008 that still persists.
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