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Golden coming of age

The winds of change blow multiple times in a person’s life. Turning points. Elevation changes in the life path, in the evolution of anyone. Jacobo Fernández is immersed in one of them. Last summer he moved to the Blume Residence in Madrid to continue progressing as a badminton player while studying the INEF career. Adding to the logical uncertainty of such a jump was a knee injury that kept him in dry dock for three months. Many conditions that disappeared with two gold medals on his return to competition in the Junior Spanish Championship last weekend in Asturias. The perfect epilogue to his formative stage before another change: his jump to senior.

“It was a mixture of feelings,” sums up the young man from Vigo, on the other side of the phone, from the state capital. Three months of hard recovery after a year with some discomfort that also accompanied him in Asturias to finish his career as a junior in style. “It was a great joy to be able to win with these impediments and finish this stage with these two golds,” he says.

The fact is that the Cíes athlete was proclaimed champion of Spain in doubles with his Granada-born partner Rubén García by beating Javier Álava and Rodrigo Sanjurjo (20-22, 21-13 and 21-12) in the final. With just 40 minutes to rest, the man from Vigo returned to the track for the individual final, in which he beat the Valencian Natxo Cerveló. He did it with suffering and after overcoming delicate moments in the game such as a 16-19 against in the first set, which Fernández converted to 21-19. He repeated the maneuver in the second by lifting four set points against.

An amazing mind. “Psychology made the difference in the end of the games. I did not win because of a physical or tactical factor but because of the mental ”, claims Jacobo, who worked in that very important part of the sport during his injury. “I was able to take advantage of this aspect to work, that in periods of greater load, it is not possible to spend so much time on it,” he reveals. Thus, his head made the difference over his physical limitations. “There were gestures and areas of the track where it was difficult for me to reach and the rivals knew it,” Fernández acknowledges with the smile of the one who was able to come out gracefully. “But the truth is that the knee did not respond at all badly,” he confirms.

With all these conditions, it is obvious that this double title is “very special” for the young man from Vigo, who has had a “very good adaptation” to his new home despite arriving injured. “The teammates gave me a great welcome and have helped me a lot with the injury. For that part, it has not been as difficult as I expected ”, emphasizes Fernández, who is studying INEF’s career at the Polytechnic of Madrid. “It shares facilities with the Blume, so it gives me certain facilities to combine classes and training,” reveals Jacobo, who has gone to Madrid to grow up. In badminton and in life. But bathed in gold.

“The main thing now is to take it easy and not be impatient”

It happens many times – most of them – that an end gives rise to a beginning. In the case of Jacobo Fernández, finishing the junior stage is his last step towards the senior category, in which he will try to fight against the best in the world. As number 2 of the state ranking in his age group, the Vigo used to enter the tables among the main seeds. Now you will have to chop stone from below. “The main thing is to take it easy and not be impatient. It is a big change that takes time ”, he assumes with maturity. “It is a matter of entering championships, getting points and with them being able to get into others of a higher level. It is perseverance, effort and making good results in the tournaments they play ”, he adds.

The first of them will be an International in Italy in December. Close 2021 with the elderly. He will do it in the doubles box with his teammate Rubén García. “I have not achieved it in the individual”, says Jacobo, who, however, is in reserve. But, true to his speech, he assumes it calmly. “We will seek to make a good result that will ensure us enter the next tournaments and get points to advance in the world ranking,” he argues. Step by step, which is how the path is made.

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