MADRID, 8 Sep. (EUROPA PRESS) –
The karate fighter and Olympic champion in Tokyo 2020 Sandra Sánchez acknowledged this Thursday that she is “very excited” about the launch of ‘Kat Karateka’, the collection of children’s books inspired by her, since “it combines two passions” of the Talaverana, “the reading and sports.
“I am very excited about this project, reaching children through reading and sports combines two of my passions and is a super positive way to get there. I was moved reading the story”, commented Sandra Sánchez at the presentation held in Madrid.
Sandra Sánchez, who is “still” ashamed to hear all the things” she has achieved, thanked the support “beyond the medals of a championship”, because sport is much more. “I have always liked reading a lot, but it is also something you have to learn, take from the base, be pushed, and for me that they are learning sports, karate and transmitting them with the values that my sport has taught me excites me “, he declared.
It seems to the Talaverana “very exciting” to think “if there will be a child in the future who will say ‘I have read Kat Karateka and I love karate'”. “When you get a project like this and being the way I am, there weren’t many doubts. Children and karate, children are another world, there is the magic, the illusion, the innocence and I am still very connected to my previous girl and I don’t want to lose it “, he explained.
“Many things are happening to me that I would never have imagined. As a child I did not think about the Olympic Games, I lived in the moment and enjoyed it, and life has given me so many exciting moments and it continues to give me so many moments that we have to let it continue coming. I enjoy everything that is happening to me,” he said.
The protagonist is a cat named Katerina, in which she sees herself reflected. “I was just as clumsy and I’m still just as clumsy. It’s karate, it’s trying to improve, it’s that illusion, that desire. There are many parts that are a little ‘Sandrita,'” she said.
“When I was a little monkey I don’t know if it was, but I was stubborn for a while. I think that perseverance, that when you want something you are going to do everything possible, that desire, that illusion to achieve something and keep learning. That being wrong is part of life and learn from your mistakes to evolve as a person”, he added.
Sandra Sánchez confessed that, although everything she received during the process was “super secret”, she showed it to her nephews, because she wanted to “have childish feedback”, and that they realized a mistake in the first edition, where his image appeared cut off. “As a result of this, when the first books arrive, I give them to my nephews and they tell me ‘aunt, you have no head,'” she said with a laugh.
The Olympic champion also remembered what she felt the first time she entered a dojo to do karate, something that is reflected in the book. “In Katerina’s language, freaking out, and in Sandra’s too. I’m going to tell you what Sandra felt, because I still remember the smell of the dojo. If you put me in with my eyes closed, I know I’m there. It’s a feeling that will leave an indelible mark on you for the rest of your life,” he said.
The karate fighter also acknowledged that she thought the work of the cartoonists was “great” for the book, that they are made “with much love.” “My knowledge of drawing is a ‘circle’ and a ‘stick’, so when he taught me things it was all great. There he allowed me to be surprised and I really like the work they have done, it is spectacular,” she said.
When I was little, I also had references of this type, among which the Dragon Ball series stands out. “It wasn’t karate as such, but I watched Dragon Ball and had all the comics. Before it was a lot of comics, more than a book as such, and more related to martial arts, Goku, but it’s true that I started watching it and then reading it “, he pointed.
“Many times life has been like a snowball that is rolling and you don’t have time to think so much, and when you see yourself reflected in something and you look back on what has happened to you, I think that’s why it moves you so much,” he concluded.