In a recent column for La Nueva España, former athlete and coach Juan José Azpeitia reflects on the physical prowess of the late Spanish long jumper Yago Lamela.
Azpeitia, who guided Lamela to his record-setting 8.56-meter jump at the 1999 World Indoor Championships in Maebashi, Japan, describes the athlete as a “beast” whose strength seemed to double with every training session.
Born in 1948 in Cangas do Morrazo, Pontevedra, Azpeitia spent decades as a physical education teacher at the Colegio San Ignacio in Oviedo. Upon graduating in 1971, he accepted a position as a coach for the University of Oviedo team and a teaching role at the School of Technical Engineering in Gijón, as reported by La Nueva España.
Developing the athlete
Azpeitia’s connection to Lamela began when the jumper was roughly 12 years old. He recalls that Lamela’s father contacted him repeatedly, eventually leading to a trial session in San Lázaro.
Despite initial skepticism about the young boy’s stature, Azpeitia was struck by his raw physical potential. “He had a strength that broke the mold,” Azpeitia told La Nueva España. “From session to session, he multiplied it by two; it was inexplicable.”
The intensity of their training was significant. Azpeitia notes that he pushed Lamela to lift as much as 225 kilograms in squats, despite the athlete weighing little more than 70 kilograms.
The path to the 8.56-meter record
The relationship between coach and athlete faced a test when Lamela moved to the United States to study at the University of Iowa. Azpeitia remembers that Lamela struggled during his time abroad, returning to Spain in poor physical condition. Following a period of focused retraining, Lamela regained his form, leading to his historic performance in Japan.
Ahead of the 1999 World Indoor Championships, Azpeitia provided specific tactical advice to his pupil. “I told him: ‘Don’t let those Cubans beat you; in Japan there is sun, lean on it and beat them all,’” Azpeitia wrote in his column. The resulting performance saw Lamela reach 8.56 meters, a mark that cemented his status as one of the premier long jumpers of his era.
A career beyond the track
Outside of his work with elite athletes, Azpeitia implemented a comprehensive sports program at the Colegio San Ignacio in Oviedo. With the support of the school’s rector, Father Fernando de la Puente, he moved away from traditional, rigid physical education to a rotating system that included judo, basketball, and athletics.
This approach allowed the school to eventually develop competitive facilities, including a natural grass football field and an indoor sports pavilion.
Azpeitia suggests that his own background, which involved navigating the physical challenges of childhood in Cangas and later training under the rigorous demands of the Residencia Blume in Madrid, shaped his perspective as a coach. His transition from a young athlete who was initially “weak and thin” to a specialized trainer for Olympic-level talent remains a defining narrative of his professional life.
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