The 2024 Paris Olympic Games are on the horizon a year away, but before the French capital brings together the best athletes on the planet, many of them still have to qualify. And in ten sports, plus another eight that award Olympic qualification ranking points, the ticket can be had at the European Games that start today (and run until July 2) in Krakow and twelve Polish regions of Malopolska. The third edition, after Baku 2015 and Minsk 2019, of this international multi-sport event organized under the supervision of the European Olympic Committees will feature 7,000 participants from 48 countries (plus four athletes from the Refugee Team), including 306 Spaniards (156 women and 150 men) with the handball player Patricia Encinas and the canoeist Carlos Arévalo as flag bearers, in 29 sports.
Walter Degirolmo FeRugbyFeRugby EFE
Spain will participate in 22 of them and arrives with two ambitious goals. Overcome the 13 medals of the last event held in Belarus (in Azerbaijan it added 30) and add Olympic places to the 11 that it already has secured for Paris 2024: the rhythmic gymnastics team, the shooter Fátima Gálvez, six places for the marathon (three for men and three for women), and three for the 20 km walk (two for men and one for women). Poland awards direct places in ten disciplines: archery, artistic swimming, boxing, breaking, slalom canoeing (white water), jumping, modern pentathlon, rugby 7, shooting and table tennis. In addition, eight other ranking points are distributed: badminton, 3×3 basketball, fencing, judo, BMX freestyle, mountain biking, taekwondo and triathlon. An important springboard, therefore, for the Olympic dream in 18 of the 29 sports, in addition to the fact that in twelve of them it will serve as the European Championship.
“Going to the Games would be a very nice objective, a perfect prize or culmination. We have to be ambitious and think we can, because it’s not unreasonable. Being realistic, we have options and it would not be unusual for us to qualify in Krakow”, says Pol Pla, player of Los Leones del seven, sport that awards the winner and sends the second and third to the playoffs. In Poland there will also be Spanish flag athletes such as Carolina Marín, Saúl Craviotto, Adriana Cerezo, Damián Quintero, Maialen Chourraut, Enmanuel Reyes Pla, Carlos Arévalo, Mario Mola, Miguel Alvariño, Fátima Gálvez, Álvaro Robles, Alberto Fernández, Antía Jácome, David Valero, Yulen Pereira, Rodrigo Germade, María Corbera or Marcus Cooper Walz.
SPAIN GOES WITH EVERYTHING IN ATHLETICS.
Athletics, where the RFEA has a very powerful selection led by names like Mohamed Katir, Ana Peleteiro, Adrián Ben, Esther Guerrero or Quique Llopis, will celebrate the European by countries and will have some stars, in addition to the Spanish, such as the Dutch Femke Bol, the Polish Pia Skrzyszowska, the Greek Miltiadis Tentoglou or the Portuguese Pedro Pablo Pichardo. Under the gaze of the dragon ‘Krakusek’ and the salamander ‘Sandra’, the two mascots of the 2023 European Games, eight sports will debut at the continental event such as rugby 7, paddle tennis, muay thay, beach handball, breaking and climbing… and two more peculiar ones such as teqball (foot table) or ski jumping on grass.