Sebastián Mora, during the Track Champions League in London.TCL
London Olympic Velodrome, where the track inspires passion. Sebastián Mora can’t take it anymore. He entered by elimination – the cyclist who finishes last in each sprint is eliminated – like never before, at the head of the group. “It costs more, you spend more because you always have to hit hard, but it’s safer,” explains the 34-year-old Pistard from Villarreal. “On the other hand, it’s like accelerating and decelerating in a car and taking risks with every sprint.”
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The tactic, so tired, was about to succeed. He must finish in the top three in the final test of the fifth and final day of the UCI Track Champions League to advance to the overall finals of the endurance category. When, exhausted, he no longer even has the strength to accelerate in the last pedal strokes of the lap and retires, three cyclists are still spinning in the velodrome. Having finished fourth, in order to assert himself in the general classification he needs his main rival, the Swiss Claudio Imhof, another velodrome animal to avoid being either first or second. He needs him as his next knockout and when he sees one of the survivors, Dutchman Matthijs Büchli, let go, he can’t help but turn and cheer him on, even giving him a nudge to keep him in the fight. wasted effort. Book does not connect. With 125 points, Imhof is already certain of the overall victory with the Spaniard and unconcernedly hands over the elimination victory to the British long-distance runner Oliver Wood, who is highly regarded by the public.
In the women’s category, the final victory of the second edition of the Champions League, five events in four weeks in the velodromes of Palma, Berlin, Paris and London, two days, went to the American Jennifer Valente; in the women’s sprint for the world champion, France’s Mathilde Gros, and in the men’s sprint for Australia’s Matthew Richardson.
The final victory and the economic reward that it brought (25,000 euros for the first, 15,000 for the second) would not have harmed Mora, the best Spanish pistard at the end of a year in which he has confirmed this despite the fact that his cycling is accelerating With into the future at breakneck speed, the ugly old habits of lifelong cycling still prevail. And he suffers them, the Spanish Olympic hope for velodromes, six-time European champion and once world champion, right in the same London velodrome, although he can be considered one of the stars of the silver screen, an avatar of Blade Runner, almost or a complex computer game in the metaverse, the immersive television broadcasts announced by Discovery Warner Bros. Contest Patron and Events Director François Ribeiro, along with Californians of Infinite and Amazon Web Services, for 2023.
“I don’t have anything for next year”
But before that, he started the year on a contract with a continental team, Granada’s Manuela Fundación, which should allow him to take part in road tests to get ground and pedaling. The story lasted three months. When he confirmed that the old adage of cycling humble would come true – if you don’t get paid the first, second and third month, you can bear it; If the room doesn’t either, you’ve lost money. The ruling refers to the fact that the teams have to pay a deposit of 25% of the annual salary to the UCI as a guarantee in the event of non-payment. Manuel Fundación has already informed the Spanish federation that he cannot accept any payment and has already started the procedures to enforce the guarantee. Every runner, including Mora, gets a quarter of their salary, three months and now, after December and January, strong months of the Six Days at the velodromes in Europe to look for a new team. What rushes with little hope.
“I don’t have anything for next year yet,” says an exceptional athlete who can be a champion and comes from a country where there are hardly any velodromes, where almost no competitions are organized and where the teams have always looked up wrong the Pistarden, although some of the best cyclists, like Thomas, Wiggins, like Ganna, went off the track. “You can see that the Spanish teams don’t dare or don’t see the potential that exists in track cycling, both in terms of sport and business. Two foreign runners have signed contracts there in England these days.” When he was younger and not yet a new father like he is now, Mora ran for teams in Japan and England at the historic Raleigh brand. He has been in Spain for the last few years, a few years with Movistar, one with Caja Rural and a few months with Manuela. And in a year and a half he will be one of the big hopes for a medal in Spanish sport at the Paris Games.
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