The end of the journey that transforms those who undertake it without fear, eyes open, well made up, clear. War paint on TikTok. Ready to fight and win! And María Vicente throws a punch, a good straight punch, into the air in front of the camera. Punch and determination. Going for her Spanish heptathlon record, which is already over five years old, to defend her eighth place, finalist two consecutive years in a major competition, after the Tokyo World Championships. To feel like a competitor again, capable. “It’s my turn to move up,” says the athlete from L’Hospitalet, 25 years old, 1.76 meters, 63 kilos. She achieves both goals. She runs the 800m in 2m 14.80s; totals 6,372 points, 68 more than the previous record. And by one point, eighth.
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The perfect mental balance. The apparent indifference (“I come like someone who breathes, because it’s time, I don’t want to compare myself to the perfect María”), the winning gene dominating everything. “I always carry the pressure inside me, it gives me life, I get here and see that I need to go to sleep with nerves on edge,” she says. “I have managed to be relaxed at some point, but seeing yourself so close, seeing that I’m starting to find sensations again, that I haven’t had any discomfort during the seven events, well that makes me want a little more, a little more…”. Only really bad was the shot put (13.09m), what she had worked on the most, the technique, the angle, the linear alignment.
“What talent, what quality, how she has been able to improve in 6-7 weeks, from nothing to here, to fight,” admires her coach in San Sebastián, Ramón Cid, precisely the day he turns 72. And always the tick in the head, what wouldn’t she have been capable of if instead of arriving with two months of training she had arrived with a full cycle?
“The real record?” adds Cid, who has lost count of the setbacks that have slowed her development since seven years ago when she was the best junior in the world in combined events. “It’s the first heptathlon she finishes without a bandage, an injection, or even minimal taping.” The physios Miguel Ángel Cos and Patricia Morales, who pamper and care for her, can attest to that.
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Two days on the track yield these results for María Vicente: 13.38s in the 100m hurdles, 1.77m in high jump, 13.09m in shot put, 23.71s in the 200m, 6.42m in long jump, 44.02m in javelin and 2m 16.47s in the 800m already on Saturday when the swift sun speeds toward its nightly hideout like her, stride after stride of her legs already sore after two days on the track, and the mind shouting, enough already, chasing the elusive shadow of Beatrice Juškeviciute, the Lithuanian who is 33 points, three seconds ahead, and when she catches her, in the only 20 meters of track still lit by the sun, she lengthens her stride and overtakes her.
The tremendous will moves her. And she accelerates toward the Italian Sveva Gerevini. She knows she has broken the record. She defends eighth place until the last breath, and she succeeds. The final victory went to the Irish Kate O’Connor (6,751).
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