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15th World Aquatics
Championships
Who will bring home a medal?
Harold Iglesias
Manresa
THE World Aquatics Championship will
be celebrating its 40th birthday when athletes
gather in Barcelona, July 19 through August 4, for
the event's 15th edition.
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Guerra and Aguirre must improve
their two and a half twist and add a
four and a half to surpass 450 points.
Cuba’s Hanser García won one gold
medal, a silver and two bronzes
in the European Mare Nostrum
competition. |
Belgrade was the site of the first
championship in 1973, when 686 athletes competed in
18 events for men and 19 for women. The United
States was the indisputable powerhouse,
overwhelmingly winning the first event. This
dominance has been challenged only a few times
during the 14 competitions held, by the former
German Democratic Republic (Madrid-1986), China (Rome-1994)
and Australia (Fukuoka-2001) as the only other
nations to take top honors.
In the history of the championships,
the 2009 event in Rome holds the record for most
participants, with 2,556. It was precisely here that
Cuba won the second of the two medals it possesses,
both earned at the diving pool. José Antonio Guerra
and Jeinkler Aguirre combined synchronization and
technique to win a bronze in platform diving with a
total score of 427.38 points, compared to the gold
medalist Chinese duo Yue Lin-Liang Huo (480.06) and
Germans Sascha Klein-Patrick Haudsing (447.24).
Guerra had previously won a silver
in Montreal (2005) for his magnificent dives worth
691.14 points. Only China's Jia Hu did better,
scoring 698.01.
The Guerra-Aguirre duo are again
generating the greatest hopes for a Cuban medal.
Freestyle swimmer Hanser García appears to be the
other Cuban athlete with good prospects, though he
is joined by several hopefuls, including backstroke
swimmers Pedro Medel and Armando Barreras, plus
butterfly specialists Alex Hernández and Lázaro
Bergara, whose chances are slimmer.
What will it take to win a medal?
Let's take an objective look at what
will be required of Guerra, Aguirre and García, who
bear the greatest responsibility for the team.
Considering the competition, it is clear that
finishing among the top three in their disciplines
will be no easy task.
The divers will surely be competing
for the second or third spot, since no one has been
able to dispute China's dominance in this event for
15 years now.
With the conclusion of the World
Diving Series, Cuba's duo has secured the number two
spot, having accumulated 126 points. Of course, only
they and the Russian leaders have participated in
all of the circuit’s six events. Notable are China's
three first-place finishes and Mexico's two, since
it has been precisely divers from these countries
who have given Guerra and Aguirre the toughest
competition, in addition to those from Russia, the
UK, the U.S. and Germany.
What's more, the Cuban duo has had
their training interrupted due to winter conditions
and the situation at the Baraguá pool complex. These
problems have affected their scores. Only in two
events did they accumulate more than 400 points. Nor
were they able to include a four and a half twist,
essential to increasing the complexity of their
program. Despite these issues, they are ranked
fourth internationally, and realistically hopeful of
a medal.
Hanser’s optimism is based on his
seventh place Olympic finishes in the 100-meter
freestyle (48.04 seconds) and the Short Course World
competition in Istanbul (47.19). He has been
participating in the European Mare Nostrum,
competing against most of the world's best swimmers,
with the exception of those from the U.S. and
Australia. In his debut in this circuit, in
Barcelona, he took the 100m gold, with a 49.14
second time, putting him in the 33rd spot of the
2013 world ranking, led by Australian James
Magnussen (47.53). In the 50-meter freestyle - not
his strong point - his 22.60 time was good for a
bronze medal and a number 55 ranking. Magnussen is
the best in this race, too, untouchable with a
21.52-second time.
Cuba's García put in an excellent
performance, as well, at the third and final stop of
the Mare Nostrum circuit in the French city of Canet,
coming away with a silver medal and a bronze.
He won the silver in the 100-meter
freestyle with a time of 48.82 seconds, bested only
by local favorite Jeremy Stravius (48.53), according
to the NotiNat website, while the bronze medal went
to Japan's Shinri Shioura (49.46).
García placed third in the 50 meters
freestyle, with a 22.38 time, joining Shioura
(22.22) and South African Roland Schoeman (22.29),
on the podium.
Cuba's best swimmer thus finishes up
his participation in the Mare Nostrum with one gold
medal, a silver and two bronzes, which augurs well
for his chances in the World Aquatics Championship
to take place in Barcelona's Palau Sant Jordi pool
complex. In the meantime, Guerra and Aguirre
continue to work on their diving form at the EIDE
sports academy pool in Matanzas. Time will tell how
far their efforts will take them.
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