“In sports, real processes are needed”
Ecuadornews:
Considered the best Ecuadorian athlete in history, the basin analyzes the present of physical activity and whether the country has talents to exploit or not. After symbolically presenting his sporting legacy to the new generations, represented by the youthful marcher David Hurtado (Team Biosil), the former athlete and the only Ecuadorian Olympic medalist, Jéfferson Pérez, talked with newspaper EL TELÉGRAFO about various topics of national physical activity. Pérez (43 years old), who will finish his MA in Political Science at the University of Salamanca (Spain) next August, considers that the best results in sport are achieved under a single formula: passion + knowledge.
Is it necessary that Ecuadorian sports have a State policy?
People who have, in addition passion, the knowledge to do it properly must be in the key places.
In 2018 it is 10 years of retirement and in a decade the country has not returned to win an Olympic medal. To what do you think is due?
It strikes me when some authorities at the end of the period say we are going to make an assessment of things, however, what happens with what has not been obtained?
I remember several sports ministers saying: we are preparing to obtain more Olympic medals, we should investigate, we should call them to give accounts.
Specifically what should be evaluated?
A much more exhaustive evaluation would have to be done of how the investment was, this to obtain knowledge and improve. It is not to condemn a person, but to know where he made the mistakes. Would it be positive to follow the Colombian work model? There a few years ago they started a work scheme, a process that now represents several Olympic and world medals.
I am going to comment on something much crueler. In 1996, Ecuador, a South American country, won an Olympic gold medal. The same year, England, European country, had an Olympic gold medal.
That is to say, in the same Olympic Games the same result. Twenty years passed and we saw that Ecuador went to the 2016 Olympic Games and got a very respectable fourth place, while England got 67 medals.
What happened?
That’s when we say we need to evaluate the quality of the investment.
How will you support David Hurtado?
He has already lost two of his best times in the youth category. Supporting David is not pushing him. I will support it by transmitting all the knowledge with the successes and mistakes that have been presented in my life.
He has a spectacular talent, I think he can be the greatest athlete of all time or perhaps of this generation, which has around 20 athletes, they will achieve the best triumphs that have been obtained.
In the case of Andrés Chocho, of what you have analyzed, what are the shortcomings of this marcher?
Because this has cost him the disqualification in four world-wide and in three Olympic tests. First you should remove the biomechanics equipment that are in the high performance centers. Second, studies in biomechanics should be done; the third would be to make the improvements, those are the points.
That would be the solution?
If we have a Ferrari dusting ourselves in the house, it does not serve as a transport. It is the same, if we have biomechanical equipment that is not being used, why have we invested so much money? This in the case of Andrés and that of many other cultores, remember that biomechanical analysis is for all disciplines.
It is important to start using these equipment now.
How do you analyze the management of the High Performance Plan, especially due to the number of changes made to it?
When there are many changes in a process, it is not called a process. When we have a single project for many years, that is a process. In Ecuador, unfortunately, if an analysis is made from the 2012 Olympic Games to the 2016 Olympic Games we had three sport ministers.
Imagine that in a cycle of the world soccer championship in four years we have four technicians. Do you think there is a process to classify the world? It will be a little difficult. The same happens in the rest of sports, if there are no processes of, minimum, four years with the same team, it will be more complicated.
Have you been tempted to be Minister of Sports?
One thing is what one feels and another thing that one shows and I think it is fundamental to start demonstrating in some extra-sports activities. It remained in the air the possibility that they could give him the gold medal of the Olympic Games of 2008 for the doping of Russian sportsmen.
Was that case closed?
There are investigations for the consumption of prohibited substances of some athletes, particularly from Russia and especially in progress. In the case of Valeri Borchin (gold in the 20 km march of Beijing 2008) he was a sportsman sanctioned by doping from 2005 to 2007; then, he participated in the 2008 Olympics and the Berlin World Cup (2009) and some additional ones.
Anyway, the International Federation of Athletics Associations (IAAF) found the tests with the new technological processes, they were made from 2009. The IAAF withdrew all the titles he won between 2009 and 2012; he only stayed with what he won in 2008, in that year gold. (I)
Source: http://www.eltelegrafo.com.ec/noticias/otros-deportes/1/en-el-deporte-hacen-falta-procesos-reales