The tears of Orlando Ortega, “neither machine nor robot”, at the Europeans in Rome | Sports

“I’m not a robot, I’m not a machine, I can’t ask for more than what I’ve worked for,” says Orlando Ortega to justify a performance (13.79s, seventh in the preliminary heat of the 110m hurdles) very far from his expectations. “I came with some cards, I bet on what I had and I went out to do my best with what I had. And this is the result, this is what he had.” The 31-year-old hurdler from Artemisa then thought that this result eliminated him from the first time on his return to the Spanish team, and he emotionally compensated for the pain it caused him with the joy of returning. “Fucking crazy, sorry for the word,” says the Rio 16 Olympic runner-up after three years of injuries, exalted. “Jolines, if you had told me two months ago that he was going to run here, I wouldn’t have believed it, but no way. We have done a beautiful job. “I am a human being and the injuries I have had mentally hurt and weigh.” And while he speaks the other series are disputed.

Four minutes later, after praising his psychologist, Toñi Martos, and after promising that he will fight to the death in the Spanish championships and wherever necessary to get a place for the Paris Games, and while he continues looking for reasons to overcome the duel , Kevin Sánchez, the second Spanish hurdler who was competing on a morning already one of those in which the sun bakes the old stones of Rome, very old, and the humidity of the Tiber soaks the backs of the tourists, comes running to his side, and tells him Let him not continue speaking like a defeated man, because despite everything that has happened, he will play in the semifinals (Saturday, 8:38 p.m.) along with Quique Llopis and Asier Martínez, the two other Spaniards, already classified ex officio. It is then that “I am not a machine, I am not a robot” takes on its full meaning, the practical demonstration of the athlete’s humanity. Ortega collapses, squats long, behind the fence of the mixed zone and squats sobbing in silence for a few minutes, and the emotional and physical transit space of all the athletes, from the track to the solitude of the locker room, the winners, the sunk , takes on a certain mystical meaning.

Ortega recovers, gets up, wipes his eyes and speaks. “This is an example of how hard it is being, man,” he tells journalists eager for emotional releases. “It hasn’t been easy, it hasn’t been easy to get here. Only my wife, my family, my psychologist, only they know how much I have fought to get here, and, damn, my six-month-old daughter, man, I have had to separate myself from her a little to try to fight, to be here. , for fulfilling a dream. And you know that I have never given up. I have always been trying to give my best in each race. And damn, finding out about this now… It’s a triumph. I played with the cards I had. And she looks where we are, we have passed. What more can I say?”

The first morning of the Europeans, as dense with Spaniards as it was hot with weather, also went well for Belén Toimil, who qualified for the shot put final (17.76m); Ana Peleteiro, the big favorite for the triple, who only needed one jump, and good luck (14.21m), to advance to the final (Sunday, 21.04); Esther Guerrero and Marta Pérez, finalists already in the 1,500m (Sunday, 10:40 p.m.); the three of the 800m, Álvaro de Arriba, the returning veteran, Adrián Ben, the finalist from Tokyo and Budapest, and even the youngster Moha Attaoui —the phrase of the day was pronounced by the Cantabrian from Sankt Moritz: “I’m like a bull and I ran with the ass”—, who went to the semifinals (Saturday, 7:50 p.m.); It was worth Eusebio Cáceres’ jump of 7.98m to reach the length final (Saturday 20.06), and the three of the 3,000m hurdles, Carolina Robles, Irene Sánchez Escribano and Blanca, are also already finalists (Sunday, 22.04). Fernández de la Granja.

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