“If I aim for the Moon and land on a mountain, well forward”. Taekwondo athlete Adriana Cerezo, known as the wonder girl who mesmerised the public with her silver medal in Tokyo, is not one to mince words or beat around the bush. She wants gold in Paris, and then in Los Angeles 2028, and to be “the best in history” in her sport… To start with, she wants everything, and then we’ll see how far she goes. She doesn’t hide it from anyone. “I’m not going to settle for anything less. In the end, if you lose tomorrow, no one will remember, for better or for worse,” says this 20-year-old from Madrid, one of the clearest medal options for the Spanish delegation. Gold, of course, after the final disappointment in Japan.
Because she proclaims it wherever she goes and because the results also put her in that privileged position of dreaming with her head. Since she enchanted everyone three years ago with her silverware and her smile, she has barely left the podium in this cycle, and in Paris she presents herself as number two in the ranking Olympic champion in the -49kg category and European champion three months ago. On Wednesday 7th August, starting at 9.00, four fights separate her from the only goal she has in mind. In parallel and in the same hall of the Grand Palais, Adrián Vicente will chase his medal in the -58kg category. Another Spaniard who figures on the list of top candidates.
“Expectations are not a burden because no one has more faith in me than me, my coach and my parents,” says Adriana Cerezo. “The day people expect me to lose, I will have to give up. I want everyone to believe that I deserve it when I am Olympic champion. I have a model of work, intensity, and enjoyment, and I want that to be reflected. Many things were seen in Tokyo and I hope that in Paris, too,” says this young woman, who has gone from surprising her rivals in Japan to challenging them in the French capital.
“She has always been like that, like a bit of a wimp. She is very intelligent, she expresses herself quite well, and she is constant and committed,” says Jesús Ramal, her trainer since she was 11 years old at the Hankuk gym, located on a small street in San Sebastián de los Reyes (Madrid), a kind of taekwondo bubble – different from the High Performance Centres – where recreational practitioners share a room with medal hopefuls. She has been there every day for a decade, except on Sundays, when she is forced to rest. “They have me grounded,” she says. From Monday to Saturday, she comes for double sessions from Alcalá de Henares, a half-hour drive away. “She has been a nuisance since she was little, but she has a button to activate and relax. She sleeps easily and has no worries,” says her trainer.
Expectations are not a burden because no one has more in me than me, my coach and my parents.
Ramal also aims for “the highest mountain”. “But,” he clarifies, “as an adult, I put myself in all scenarios and, if she falls, I will make up a story and redirect her to another challenge,” he confesses. “The Thai (Panipak Wongpattanakit), the Turkish (Merce Dincel), the Chinese (Qing Guo) are her great rivals, although the favourites do not usually win by a very high percentage. We have to be careful that we do not get an Adriana, because she was not the favourite in Tokyo,” he warns.
Cerezo, who admits that she has often been unaware of all that her freshness has conveyed, says that in these three years she has not had the strength to watch the entire final in Japan, where she lost the gold in the last seconds to Wongpattanakit, the current number one. She does not usually do so, but in this case even less so. “If I watch a piece, I do not sleep well. I was not aware that I was doing better. Nor did I have Jesus nearby to tell me that I could do more. I should have won,” admits the young woman, who despite her maximum ambitions does not lose sight of the unpredictable nature of her sport, in which everything is contested in one day. “The one you think is the worst gets up inspired and is the champion. In athletics, I do not believe that the one with the last time will win,” she points out.
She has always been a bit of a badass. She is very intelligent, expresses herself quite well, and is consistent and committed.
Jesus Ramal, his coach
“It has been three intense, but exciting years,” the taekwondo athlete sums up about the Olympic cycle that has confirmed her in the elite. She and her team also had to deal with the consequences of the success in Tokyo. “I wasn’t very aware of this at the beginning either,” Ramal admits. “Sports managers, sponsors, scholarships appeared… But we have been exploring it calmly and she has her feet on the ground,” adds the coach.
In a trunk in Saudi Arabia
Meanwhile, Cerezo is already in her third year of Criminalistics, “which is not Criminology,” she points out. “Criminalistics is all the scientific part, toxicology, ballistics, study of scenarios… That would take me to the police, insurance issues, expert reports… I was going to study Biochemistry, but speaking with my father, he said to me: ‘Do you see yourself in a laboratory in 10 years?’ No way,” she remembers. “She is in year-to-year courses and I am trying to retain her,” admits Jesús Ramal. “Make this one for me in two years,” I tell her. Because if she doesn’t take hours of training from me, she has to do it from somewhere. And she will be taking it from her break, which I consider a priority,” adds her coach. Something she denies: “I no longer stay up until two in the morning. I am forbidden to do so.”
Adriana Cerezo has done it all so far: she has been able to hit the ground running and compete in competitions while living adventures like the one in Saudi Arabia just after turning 18. “We wanted to take an Uber after training, but the app was only for girls and they wouldn’t accept us for the ride. Suddenly, a car arrived and a bunch of kids started getting out. But there were about 10 of them, it looked like the Simpsons car. They knew me from the Games, they asked me for a photo and we asked them to take us to a supermarket. But there were only five seats, and there were five of us plus the two kids. So I got into the trunk with another friend and then we found out that the driver was 14 years old. In this time, everything has happened to us,” says the young woman, thin, tall and always with a good face.
An intense journey on the way to the Paris Games. “If she enters with what she is, we will have a good chance of success,” concludes her coach Jesús Ramal.
You can follow EL PAÍS Sports on Facebook and Xor sign up here to receive the Daily newsletter of the Paris Olympic Games.
