“Seeing my name on the screen, with all my people a few meters away, is priceless”
MADRID, 17 Ago. (EUROPA PRESS) –
The Spanish athlete, Asier Martínez, described his victory in the final of the 110 meter hurdles on Wednesday as “incredible”, a gold medal at the European Championships in which he beat one of his benchmarks and which he was able to celebrate with his people at the Munich Olympic.
“For me it has been incredible. That close arrival with someone who for me is a technical reference, as an athlete. I have been following Martinot since I have known athletics and reaching that finish line so tight, with an athlete like him, is incredible”, he said in statements provided by the Royal Spanish Athletics Federation (RFEA), collected by Europa Press.
The Navarrese, who had just won bronze at last month’s World Cup in Oregon (United States), won an exciting final that required the ‘photo-finish’, beating Frenchman Pascal Martinot-Lagarde by one thousandth. “I don’t know what to say. I haven’t quite assimilated what happened in Oregon, it’s going to be hard for me to assimilate this too. It’s time to rest. It’s been a tough championship, hard to manage that pressure, and I want to rest,” he explained.
Martínez improved once again in a great event, as he has been doing brilliantly since last summer at the Tokyo 2020 Olympic Games, to win his second international medal in a month at the age of 22. “Seeing my name on the screen, with all my people a few feet away, is priceless,” he said.
“I’m also very happy for Quique because he has also brought out his best version in this Championship”, he added, remembering his compatriot and friend Llopis, who also ran the final and finished seventh after losing his stride after hitting the first hurdles.
The athlete from Zizur insisted that the favorite vitola forced him to a new and pressure scenario that he was able to handle thanks to his team. “Incredible for me, incredible feeling and a great prize also for all my people who have been helping me in these moments also complicated by pressure”, he concluded.