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Olympic round-up: Spain's brilliant eleventh-hour haul
07/08/2021
MORE than Sydney, fewer than Athens, London or Peking, Spain has matched its Olympic medal haul from Rio 2016 and Atlanta 1996, with fewer golds than at the last Games but more diplomas, with 179 of Spain's 322 competitors – 56% in total – netting top eight positions.
Sporting achievements are always more than the colour of the award – in Tokyo 2020, competitors such as Pablo Carreño (men's tennis) and David Valero (mountain-biking) earned bronzes that represent more blood, sweat and tears than the easily-won golds of others; an eighth-place diploma in a huge field of some of the best players in their discipline of far more personal value than a medal gained against a small number of rivals where the standard was relatively low.
It's all relative, and whilst Spain always hopes to top its record of 22, with 13 golds and ranking sixth in the world, from its hitherto sole home-turf Games – Barcelona 1992 – those who flew back from Japan with decorations are justifiably delighted.
From medal 10 to medal 17 inclusive
We revealed the first nine medal-winners in our article here, but since then, Spain upped its gold reserves by 200% - from one to three – and nearly doubled its collection overall, to 17.
Number 10 went to Nico Rodríguez and Jordi Xammar, who earned a bronze in men's 470 sailing, behind Sweden's Dahlberg and Bergström who took the silver, and successfully fighting off their nearest threat, New Zealand, the only rival near enough to put their podium position in jeopardy – they finished on 45 points to Sweden's 41, but none of the field had a hope of catching Australian duo Belcher and Ryan, who got the gold with 21 points.
Next up, Sandra Sánchez clinched the second gold for Spain in what will have to be her last Olympics, as karate will no longer be one of the sports included on the schedule in Paris 2024.
Currently world number one – where she has been for the past five years - but fairly old for an Olympic karateca at 39, Sandra, from Talavera de la Reina (Toledo province) was the favourite to win and was in the lead from the start, seeing off rival Kiyou Shimizu from Japan in the final, and who took the silver.
Sandra has finally achieved the one award that was missing, an Olympic gold, having netted two world championships and five European championships – and she might rise to three world titles before she hits 40, as she plans to enter the 2021 competition.
Spain was very much on a roll for a day or so, with the very next medal being a gold – this time for Alberto Ginés in climbing – and will go down in sporting history, given that Tokyo 2020 is the first time this has ever been an Olympic sport, so Alberto has never before competed in the Games; and he's only 18.
The first Olympic medallist in climbing ever, the teen from Cáceres, Extremadura scaled the wall and finished on 28 points, ahead of the USA's Nathaniel Coleman who took the silver for 30 points and Austria's Jakob Schubert, who got the bronze with 35 points; he topped the ranking in all three disciplines – speed, boulder and lead.
Spain finished its Olympic karate career on excellent form, with Damián Quintero – also world number one, in the men's category – finishing on 27.66 points in the final with a silver, behind his rival Ryo Kiyuna, from Japan, on 28.72.
Oddly enough, Damián and Ryo came face to face in the final of the world championships in 2016 and 2018, ending on exactly the same result: Damián with the silver, and Ryo with the gold, of which he has won four at that level.
Damián was supposed to be second flag-bearer at the closing ceremony, but the International Olympic Committee (COI) decided that only one person could do so, meaning Sandra, as a gold medallist, had to do so alone.
Her predecessor, power-walker Jesús Ángel García Bragado, who did so in Rio 2016, made history in Tokyo by having competed in more Olympics than anyone else in the modern era – a total of eight, this latest being at age 51, and although he has never yet won a medal, he has several diplomas including a fourth place this time around.
For the opening ceremony, the COI permitted two standard-bearers, with at least one required to be female, so swimmer Mireia Belmonte and canoeist Saúl Craviotto carried the flag.
And Saúl Craviotto, who has now won more Olympic medals than any other Spaniard – five, the same as fellow canoeist David Cal, but with two golds, two silvers and a bronze to Cal's one gold and four silvers – came second in the team 500 metres K-4 with his compatriots Rodrigo Germade, Carlos Arévalo and Marcus Walz, gaining a silver.
The last three medals were also team efforts – the women's waterpolo squad earned a silver, the men's handball team gained a bronze, and the men's football team got the 17th and final medal of the Games, a silver.
Spain also gained 42 diplomas, which are given from fourth to eighth place, compared with 38 at Rio 2016 – and the number of fourth places rose from six to eight, meaning more Spanish competitors within inches of a medal.
Now, Spain is focusing on Paris 2024, and new names are expected to appear on the scene, as well as first-timers from Tokyo 2020 returning.
One of these is Adriana Cerezo who, at just 17, gained Spain's first medal of the Games – a silver in Taekwondo.
The Madrid-born teen's first-ever Olympics was a 'rollercoaster ride', she admitted – although she wanted the gold, she was content with her silver, and saw the funny side of an embarrassing moment: She had had the words 'Train hard, dream big' printed on her belt in Korean, but made a mistake in the translation.
“Instead of 'train' as in, practise, it said 'train' as in, transport,” laughs a red-faced Adriana.
“They're now making a new belt for me. My head's spinning.”
Why 17 medals and 22nd place is a brilliant result
It's tempting to feel disappointed for Spain when consulting the rest of the world's medal count – the UK with 65, including 22 golds, coming fourth behind Japan's 58 with 27 golds, and the staggering results for China, with 88, of which 38 were gold, or the outright 'best in Tokyo', the USA, with 39 gold medals out of a total of 113.
But Spain's sports personalities have to work hard – in more ways than one.
Alberto Ginés only has much smaller walls than Olympic ones to train on; he is still waiting for the Aqua Centre next to the Wanda Metropolitan stadium in Madrid to open with its promised Olympic-sized climbing wall, but the works have been halted for years.
Sandra Sánchez had to give up her sport for several years to care for her mother, who was ill.
Most of Spain's Olympic competitors have day jobs, often full-time, to pay the bills, so they cannot dedicate as much of their time on training.
Handball team member Gonzalo Pérez de Vargas, who earned a bronze, said: “In France and other countries, there's a lot more investment and a lot of infrastructure.”
Like many countries, Spain does have a non-government pot available – in the UK, the National Lottery finances Olympic sports – and in this case, it is the ADO, a joint public- and private-sector initiative.
But although it helped fund some real successes in Seoul 1988 and Barcelona 1992, the last two Games have seen a drastic drop – from €79 million in these earlier Olympics down to an historic low of €22m between 2016 and 2020.
Italy's sports demographic is similar to that of Spain – seven in 10 of the former's Olympic competitors are in the Armed Forces or police, a total of 270 out of its 383 in Tokyo – and the country takes home 40 medals, of which 10 are gold and 10 are silver.
But Italy invested over €70m in Tokyo 2020, compared with Spain's €40m.
With a much smaller budget and sportsmen and sportswomen often having to combine jobs and family commitments with their Olympic discipline, Spain's overall achievements – especially since Barcelona 1992 – have been enormous and admirable.
Related Topics
MORE than Sydney, fewer than Athens, London or Peking, Spain has matched its Olympic medal haul from Rio 2016 and Atlanta 1996, with fewer golds than at the last Games but more diplomas, with 179 of Spain's 322 competitors – 56% in total – netting top eight positions.
Sporting achievements are always more than the colour of the award – in Tokyo 2020, competitors such as Pablo Carreño (men's tennis) and David Valero (mountain-biking) earned bronzes that represent more blood, sweat and tears than the easily-won golds of others; an eighth-place diploma in a huge field of some of the best players in their discipline of far more personal value than a medal gained against a small number of rivals where the standard was relatively low.
It's all relative, and whilst Spain always hopes to top its record of 22, with 13 golds and ranking sixth in the world, from its hitherto sole home-turf Games – Barcelona 1992 – those who flew back from Japan with decorations are justifiably delighted.
From medal 10 to medal 17 inclusive
We revealed the first nine medal-winners in our article here, but since then, Spain upped its gold reserves by 200% - from one to three – and nearly doubled its collection overall, to 17.
Number 10 went to Nico Rodríguez and Jordi Xammar, who earned a bronze in men's 470 sailing, behind Sweden's Dahlberg and Bergström who took the silver, and successfully fighting off their nearest threat, New Zealand, the only rival near enough to put their podium position in jeopardy – they finished on 45 points to Sweden's 41, but none of the field had a hope of catching Australian duo Belcher and Ryan, who got the gold with 21 points.
Next up, Sandra Sánchez clinched the second gold for Spain in what will have to be her last Olympics, as karate will no longer be one of the sports included on the schedule in Paris 2024.
Currently world number one – where she has been for the past five years - but fairly old for an Olympic karateca at 39, Sandra, from Talavera de la Reina (Toledo province) was the favourite to win and was in the lead from the start, seeing off rival Kiyou Shimizu from Japan in the final, and who took the silver.
Sandra has finally achieved the one award that was missing, an Olympic gold, having netted two world championships and five European championships – and she might rise to three world titles before she hits 40, as she plans to enter the 2021 competition.
Spain was very much on a roll for a day or so, with the very next medal being a gold – this time for Alberto Ginés in climbing – and will go down in sporting history, given that Tokyo 2020 is the first time this has ever been an Olympic sport, so Alberto has never before competed in the Games; and he's only 18.
The first Olympic medallist in climbing ever, the teen from Cáceres, Extremadura scaled the wall and finished on 28 points, ahead of the USA's Nathaniel Coleman who took the silver for 30 points and Austria's Jakob Schubert, who got the bronze with 35 points; he topped the ranking in all three disciplines – speed, boulder and lead.
Spain finished its Olympic karate career on excellent form, with Damián Quintero – also world number one, in the men's category – finishing on 27.66 points in the final with a silver, behind his rival Ryo Kiyuna, from Japan, on 28.72.
Oddly enough, Damián and Ryo came face to face in the final of the world championships in 2016 and 2018, ending on exactly the same result: Damián with the silver, and Ryo with the gold, of which he has won four at that level.
Damián was supposed to be second flag-bearer at the closing ceremony, but the International Olympic Committee (COI) decided that only one person could do so, meaning Sandra, as a gold medallist, had to do so alone.
Her predecessor, power-walker Jesús Ángel García Bragado, who did so in Rio 2016, made history in Tokyo by having competed in more Olympics than anyone else in the modern era – a total of eight, this latest being at age 51, and although he has never yet won a medal, he has several diplomas including a fourth place this time around.
For the opening ceremony, the COI permitted two standard-bearers, with at least one required to be female, so swimmer Mireia Belmonte and canoeist Saúl Craviotto carried the flag.
And Saúl Craviotto, who has now won more Olympic medals than any other Spaniard – five, the same as fellow canoeist David Cal, but with two golds, two silvers and a bronze to Cal's one gold and four silvers – came second in the team 500 metres K-4 with his compatriots Rodrigo Germade, Carlos Arévalo and Marcus Walz, gaining a silver.
The last three medals were also team efforts – the women's waterpolo squad earned a silver, the men's handball team gained a bronze, and the men's football team got the 17th and final medal of the Games, a silver.
Spain also gained 42 diplomas, which are given from fourth to eighth place, compared with 38 at Rio 2016 – and the number of fourth places rose from six to eight, meaning more Spanish competitors within inches of a medal.
Now, Spain is focusing on Paris 2024, and new names are expected to appear on the scene, as well as first-timers from Tokyo 2020 returning.
One of these is Adriana Cerezo who, at just 17, gained Spain's first medal of the Games – a silver in Taekwondo.
The Madrid-born teen's first-ever Olympics was a 'rollercoaster ride', she admitted – although she wanted the gold, she was content with her silver, and saw the funny side of an embarrassing moment: She had had the words 'Train hard, dream big' printed on her belt in Korean, but made a mistake in the translation.
“Instead of 'train' as in, practise, it said 'train' as in, transport,” laughs a red-faced Adriana.
“They're now making a new belt for me. My head's spinning.”
Why 17 medals and 22nd place is a brilliant result
It's tempting to feel disappointed for Spain when consulting the rest of the world's medal count – the UK with 65, including 22 golds, coming fourth behind Japan's 58 with 27 golds, and the staggering results for China, with 88, of which 38 were gold, or the outright 'best in Tokyo', the USA, with 39 gold medals out of a total of 113.
But Spain's sports personalities have to work hard – in more ways than one.
Alberto Ginés only has much smaller walls than Olympic ones to train on; he is still waiting for the Aqua Centre next to the Wanda Metropolitan stadium in Madrid to open with its promised Olympic-sized climbing wall, but the works have been halted for years.
Sandra Sánchez had to give up her sport for several years to care for her mother, who was ill.
Most of Spain's Olympic competitors have day jobs, often full-time, to pay the bills, so they cannot dedicate as much of their time on training.
Handball team member Gonzalo Pérez de Vargas, who earned a bronze, said: “In France and other countries, there's a lot more investment and a lot of infrastructure.”
Like many countries, Spain does have a non-government pot available – in the UK, the National Lottery finances Olympic sports – and in this case, it is the ADO, a joint public- and private-sector initiative.
But although it helped fund some real successes in Seoul 1988 and Barcelona 1992, the last two Games have seen a drastic drop – from €79 million in these earlier Olympics down to an historic low of €22m between 2016 and 2020.
Italy's sports demographic is similar to that of Spain – seven in 10 of the former's Olympic competitors are in the Armed Forces or police, a total of 270 out of its 383 in Tokyo – and the country takes home 40 medals, of which 10 are gold and 10 are silver.
But Italy invested over €70m in Tokyo 2020, compared with Spain's €40m.
With a much smaller budget and sportsmen and sportswomen often having to combine jobs and family commitments with their Olympic discipline, Spain's overall achievements – especially since Barcelona 1992 – have been enormous and admirable.
Related Topics
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