The Spanish Mariano García hung a historic gold medal in the 800 meters of the World Indoor Athletics Championships, this Saturday in Belgrade.
The 24-year-old middle-distance runner from Murcia finished the race in 1:46.20, beating Kenyan Noah Kibet (1:46.35), silver, and American Bryce Hoppel (1:46.51), bronze, on the podium.
“I have worked hard since I had to have surgery for appendicitis and here we are, celebrating the title of world champion. We hope that everything continues like this and that we continue to improve,” said Mariano García after his success.
“The race has been very fast at the beginning. I have controlled and little by little I have gone forward. Nobody could pass me at the end and I have been the world champion”, he pointed out.
The also Spanish Álvaro de Arriba (1:46.58) was in fourth place, on the verge of a medal.
It is the first Spanish medal in this World Cup in Belgrade and the second gold that Spain has won in an indoor athletics World Cup, after the one achieved by the shot putter Manuel Martínez in 2003.
Mariano García arrived at this event with the best world time of the season, the 1:45.12 he achieved in a World Indoor Tour event in Staten Island (New York) and which is also a Spanish record.
In the previous edition of the Indoor World Championship, in Birmingham in 2018, Spain had also managed to get one of its representatives on the podium, but then it was with a bronze, achieved by Saúl Ordóñez.
The Spanish balance in Birmingham-2018 was a total of two bronzes.
The Nanjing (China) edition, initially scheduled for 2020, was delayed by the covid pandemic to 2021 and finally moved to 2023 for the same reason. That is why four years have passed between two editions of the Indoor World Cup, instead of the two years that there is usually a margin between one and the other.
