MADRID, 8 Ago. (EUROPA PRESS) –
Former Cuban athlete Javier Sotomayor, high jump world record holder, has been received by the mayor of Guadalajara, Ana Guarinos, and the sports councilor, Armengol Engonga, when celebrating, a few days ago, the 30th anniversary of his current world record of 2.45 meters outdoors.
Sotomayor owns one of the longest records in the history of world athletics, dating from July 27, 1993, when he jumped 2.45 meters at an annual meeting held in the city of Salamanca. She is also still the indoor world record holder (2.43 meters since 1989). He was an Olympic champion at the Barcelona ’92 Games and a six-time world champion, successes for which he was awarded the Prince of Asturias Award for Sports in 1993.
During the meeting, Guarinos congratulated Javier Sotomayor for maintaining the validity of the brand and highlighted the city’s links with athletics, with the Cuban team and with many other elite athletes who choose Guadalajara as the base for their training. “Having sports leaders like Javier Sotomayor in the city, who carry and boast the name and the city of Guadalajara wherever they go, is a true honor,” he said.
Sotomayor was accompanied by the Cuban delegation that trains in the city, as well as his children, including Jaxier, a high jumper who also trains in Guadalajara and who recently became the Spanish champion in the Under-16 category.
Sotomayor lives in Guadalajara with his entire family, although he is active as a businessman in Cuba and owns a bar in Havana called 2.45, the name of the height he surpassed three decades ago. In addition, he remains linked to the Cuban Athletics Federation.
The person in charge of the Cuban team, José Luis Aguilera; the Provincial Athletics Delegate of the Royal Spanish Athletics Federation (RFEA), Julián García García; and other people linked to the world of sports and athletics, including relatives of Juanjo Díaz, who was the athletics delegate in Guadalajara when the Cuban team arrived in Guadalajara, and Eladio Freijo.
“Guadalajara will once again be a benchmark in sports, a sports city, both for the importance of sport in the professional and personal life, as well as for the values it represents of effort, sacrifice, discipline, self-improvement, teamwork and others. similar,” Guarinos said.
In addition, he assured that sports “is essential for a healthy life, physically and psychologically.” “And, also, it is fun, a way to spend free time and have fun. For this reason, Guadalajara has to once again be a meeting place and a place to welcome sports and athletes. For Guadalajara, sport has to be a window open to the world “, the window that makes the image of Guadalajara known and projected throughout the world. Sport is the best projection of the image of Guadalajara throughout the world, our best showcase,” he stressed.
“During the last few years, sport has tiptoed through Guadalajara, it has not had the recognition it deserves nor has it been given the importance it has. Fortunately, both I personally, as well as the sports councilor and the rest of the government team “We have a much more open and broad vision of what sport is and represents in life. Fortunately, things are already changing and Guadalajara will once again be the benchmark in sports that should never have ceased to be,” he concluded.
On the other hand, the mayoress presented Sotomayor with a replica of the seal of the city of Guadalajara, from the first half of the 13th century. The seal contains a view of the then city of Guadalajara and the figure of one of its knights carrying the banner of the Council.