With the relay runners still jumping after their four-handed bomb, Dani Arce launched himself at the purpose of his life: a gold medal at a European Championship, the territory where he has insisted on succeeding. The 3,000m steeplechase specialist, 34 candles blown out, a bronze at home, does not want lesser prizes. Only gold is good enough. All or nothing. That is why, as soon as the gun sounded, the Burgos native from Cardeñadijo, where he cares for his mother with multiple sclerosis, with the love of a good son, accelerated to take the lead of the group. Frederik Ruppert, the only finalist who has run under eight minutes in the 3,000m steeplechase, saw his reaction, stepped up the pace, and positioned himself beside him. “You’re not going to get away from me that easily,” he seemed to say. The pulse had begun.
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The Spaniard, inside. The German, beside him, outside. One lap and another and another. Like that until the bell rang. The alarm that detonated the race as soon as Ruppert stepped up the pace at a rhythm unbearable for the others until crossing the finish line, already champion, in 8m 25.33s. Arce melted away and ended up being overtaken in this last lap by Ruben Querinjean, silver, and the first medal for Luxembourg in Birmingham, and the other German, Karl Bebendorf, bronze.
Again at the gates. Like in Rome, where he was fifth. Or in Munich, where he moved up from fourth place in the race to retroactive bronze due to a cheating rival who ended up being caught.
That is why he thinks nothing less than gold is good enough. Arce thinks that is what he lacks. Because he has always been a nonconformist. His thing is not to wait in a chair for medals to fall. From Burgos he moved to León to learn from a young coach, José Enrique Villacorta. And as soon as he heard that in Alicante there was a coach passionate about science, Roberto Cejuela, who had made a career with triathletes, he called him on the phone and asked if he could help him.
“I have always sought excellence,” said the Burgos native after the race. “I have done everything through work and sacrifice, those are the values that luckily my family, my friends, my acquaintances, with whom I surround myself, have given me, and well, everything I can do with my hands as long as it is clean, I will do it and keep doing it. Maybe there is another European Championship and I will continue with the same mentality, because in the end tenacity is what breaks the stone like water.” Drop after drop, Arce does not give up.
The famous Spanish 4x400m relay runners, winners last year at the World Relays and silver this season, as well as the bronze medal at the last World Championships in Torun, this time missed the podium despite offering the good performance that distinguishes them. Spain finished fourth in a final in which the Netherlands withstood the pressure from Great Britain, and Italy that of Blanca Hervás, who tried a glorious comeback running the last lap in 49.99s. Paula Sevilla put them in orbit with a great first leg (51.6s). The sprinter from La Solana handed over the baton in second position. Then Ana Prieto and Rocío Arroyo fell to sixth and Hervás got close to the medals but did not manage to finish it off. Nevertheless, Spain achieved the third-best mark in its history, the best historical position in a European Championship, and the best mark in the continental championship. A great job by the Spanish team.
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