And, after all, great games.
Those of the Covid, those of the uncertainty, those of silence in the stands, those of the great absences for Spain, those of the infinite legends of our sport that they said goodbye … those of the 17 medals.
And the games in which we learned to decipher a kata (or try).
The usual games.
Stagnant?
Maybe
In crisis?
Not so much.
Olympically Spain, we must conclude, it is the clamp that goes from 15 to 20 medals.
If there are more golds, like river, more joy.
If there are more medals of them, as in London, more hope.
If the veterans earn them, more recognition.
If you are young people who push, more illusion.
In Tokyo a mixture of all that occurred.
With an asterisk to consider.
There were only three golds and specialties, with all the respects, with not too much, let’s call it that, roots.
They can not be subtracted or a merit.
On the contrary, shot, climbing and karate, so minority the first two, so sadly little Olympic the third, increase its golden value for its exclusivity.
But you can not ignore the general gasside among the Spanish envoys when the aim of Alberto Fernández and Fátima Gálvez granted the first joy.
Because the ‘hunting’ figure of him, shotgun on the shoulder, red glasses and a vest to which one imagined a hat of hanging partridges, contrasted with Niko Shera’s Hercule.
He cried desperately the Juda, one of those ‘safe’ medals that were going to escape.
They smiled the shooters, pure spontaneity, an Olympic classics who had always been so close to the target that no longer counted with them.
The veterans were the cross of these games, although it is true that we should not demand much more for guys who already left us a life of amazement.
A Alejandro Valverde, Javier Gómez Noya, Mireia Belmonte, the Gasol brothers, Carla Suárez, Laia Palau … what to tell them if you thank you.
By the way, in cycling, chaotic since the night before an auxiliary gave positive and untied all the alarms, the supplication went beyond Fuji.
Both Joseba Elyuezabal and the Momparler coach, the roommate of him who also came up, passed 14 days, like a penance, in his village room.
They escaped towards Spain do nothing, with a booth of welcome biblical dimensions waiting for them.
Another thing that could not be missing in Tokyo either were the suspicion.
The ‘ENS robbing’ Olympic version.
There can be no games without his little dandruff.
Although, it is true, among the displaced troop does not distil both chauvinism and the one that comes from some television and radio comments.
But of course, it also gives for the blush when in sports as fulguled as boxing or judo, so for expert eyes, so millimeters and adjusted, there was a threatening about that decision of the judges who harmed us.
“I have seen it clear!”, It was heard.
Here you could insert that emoticon from a thoughtful face.
Afterwards, some athletes climbed to the wave of protest (perhaps rightly) and others, more elegant, to self-criticism.
Those extremes were well seen in the boxing, where they ‘clearly stolen the medal of Enmanuel Reyes Pla-the Prophet, a single Pugil for his daring, his talent and his verbiere to Mohamed Ali- and that of Gabriel Escobar.
The poor Gazi Jalidov, another great news of our sport, types with vital stories of those who make empathize, there was no doubt: Russian Khataev knocked him so savagely that he unleashed a wave of concern in the stands for the state of health.
On the opposite side, the Karate, where neither an excuse in the score was scoring Damián Quintero, although when the day before Sandra Sánchez wore his gold won to La Japanese and still slid a “I almost lied” for the judges, they all thought about
May the malagueño went “to pay all together”, because he also presumably was going to see them with the place, as it was.
The eternal bus displacements from one headquarters to another, previous way through the MPC (press center), give for many cabals (and for many heads too, in Japan call it ‘inemuri’).
What’s the accounts of medals is a classic since day.
Those first days of semilibertad, of a quarantine who fulfilled Rajatabla, others obviated Rajatabla and most challenged as children playing English hiding place (every day one step further and five more minutes, to see what happened), the companions
Brand recorded a survey.
And they all nail it because, returning to the top, Spain is the fork that goes from 15 to 20.
And they were the days of pessimism.
Extreme pessimism.
As in all games.
More than this Spain that usually comes to something very ours on the other hand, leave everything for the last moment.
Because after Adriana cherry adolescent and early joy, one of those puffs of fresh air that enlightens everything, reached the chain disappointments like a torrent.
The triathlon – with an improper early morning to go to Odaiba Park that one did not know on what day he was-, the judo, cycling, the contagion of Jon Rahm, the tennis players who were dehydrated or fell into quarters, the Orlando’s injury
Ortega …
But an Olympic event is so frantic that, suddenly, Novak Djokovic infuriates -sus memes, another image of the games – and Pablo Carreño wins the bronze of a life with the chicharras (the Japanese specimen reaches amazing dimensions) as a soundtrack.
And Maialen Chourraut extends the legend of her in the Bravas waters of the Kasai canal, as she days later she was going to do it in the quiet Teresa Portela, reward a beautiful Olympic career.
And, before, very early, a bike bench as David Valero surprises the world on Mount Izu with a heroic comeback that he remembered that of five years ago in Río de his Mentor Carlos Coloma and in which he took ahead
A myth like Nino Schurter.
That’s how the games are.
The contagious joy of Ana Peleteiro and Ray Zapata, in his timely anti-racket vindication, and the giant emotion of whom he heard, pronounce the inevitable to two brothers who, as Scariolo said, are not a history of Spanish basketball, they are worldwide sport.
The goodbye of the gas in contrast, for example, with the gold in climbing, another unusual discipline and also very conducive to the Guas, by Alberto Ginés.
Games who did not attend Nadal, Ni Carolina Marín, the games in which our classics, sailing and canoeing, accumulated more setbacks than triumphs (the bronze of Xammar and Nico Rodríguez and the Silver of K4 avoided the debacle), in which
Team sports did not fail again (all in quarters less the female handball and three medals), but neither will we succeed, because we continue without gold since Atlanta 96, was also that of Alexandrinas.
There was no press conference via zoom-they were missing the face-to-face, the pandemic obliges- that it was not inaugurated with his speech by always enthusiastic Alejandro Blanco.
Also the image of him in the corrosses of the medals in football and handball, among others, called attention, as a strange element in intimacy.
Although for a strange element Miquel Iceta, the ineffable new sports minister who came almost over the time to Tokyo, so that the photo with the protagonist of the day was not missing.
Big games yes.
And you can already ask what you want about katas.
