“It took me a while to assimilate that I was the first Spanish athlete to win a medal”

The march has been the pioneering discipline for Spanish athletics at the Games. In Moscow’80, Jordi Llopart achieved the first silver in the 50-kilometer march, and 20 years later it was María Vasco who obtained that wonderful privilege in the 20-kilometer march in Sydney with her bronze.

– What do you remember from that race?

– I don’t have the feeling that 20 years have passed. I have intact that memory of reaching the finish line, when they tell me that I am going bronze, when they hang the medal on me … When I turn 70 it will be the same because I keep it in my head and in my heart.

– Do you feel more pioneering now than then?

– Do you know what happens? I was not aware of what I had achieved. It took me a while to assimilate that there had not been an Olympic medal in women’s athletics until then. It was not easy to carry that responsibility.

– Before Sydney you considered leaving the march … What was it that excited you again?

– I have it in my veins. I was born with it. It is something that you carry inside and you return to it.

– There was a before and after that medal. You began to achieve great triumphs. Has your mind changed? Did you discover then what a great athlete you were?

– I matured sportingly and as a person. I got that medal when I was 23 years old, then the Edmonton World Cup came and I finished fifth. For the country it was crap and for me it was very important. Then there were times when she came very well trained and failed in the competition. I had to start another type of preparation which consisted of believing in myself. In 2006 my father passed away and I said to myself ‘either you take out everything you have inside or it makes no sense to continue in athletics’. I realized that my biggest rival was myself.

– Let’s rewind a bit. You are from Viladecans, like Valentí Massana, Maricruz Díaz, Reyes Sobrino. What does Viladecans have?

– He’s got a lot going! Many people have gone out on the march, we had a teacher who gave Physical Education at school, and he would put the children on the march, and that was the beginning. I did not get out of there, mine was a different case, I fell in love with the march on television, watching a championship.

In five games

– Atlanta, Sydney, Athens, Beijing … Ever thought you’d be at a Games. When was your dream born?

– And London. I’ve been to five Games. And each one was very different. Athletes are like wine, we mature and learn over the years. In Atlanta I was 18 years old, it was some Games that I didn’t like. Sydney was the opposite, in Athens I had a hard time getting into shape. Shortly before Beijing I was injured and that separated me from the medals, although I fought it to the end, and I held out until the 18 and a half kilometer. I was fifth with a Spanish record. It took me a lot to prepare for the London Games at 38 years old. We didn’t make it to the Olympic stadium, but it was amazing to march through Hyde Park, I finished tenth but I am an Olympic diploma for the positives.

– When was the Olympic dream born?

– When I was 12-13 years old, I went to world championships of a higher category and I began to dream of the Games. And I went to five.

– 5, 10, 20 kilometers walk. Would you have dared 50?

– Probably yes, because if I am something I am stubborn. When they put the 20th, I gave thanks because the 10th was not enough for me. I am anti 50 because it seems like a very exaggerated distance.

– What would you say to those who start and want to be like María Vasco?

– That they enjoy, that they do it because they want to. My parents never forbid me anything, although they suffered because they saw that it was very hard, that they do what they are passionate about, that they dream about it, and that they take advantage of the values ​​of sport.

Teaching the pandemic

– What has athletics brought you?

– I am still the same woman who started with ten years, my medals have not changed. We are all the same, we are not better than anyone else, they can value you, but nothing more. Athletics has taught me to fight, to suffer, it has given me companionship, friendships. And it has taught me how to win and how to lose.

– And this terrible pandemic?

– To know how to take everything more calmly, that you can go out, that we all have to go to one. To have a discipline, many people have had to reinvent themselves and have been strengthened, and that has helped me to know where I want to continue.

– If you had to choose between an eraser, to erase something from your past, or a pencil to continue writing the story of your life …

– I keep writing. I am not going to erase anything, because from what I was wrong, I have learned.