Sitting in a marching competition with Jesús Ángel García Bragado is presenting yourself to a master class, an enjoyment that should be available to all athletic fans. Before the giant screens installed in the Corniche, the waterfront of Doha, the finalist last Saturday observes the 20 kilometers march in the female category and predicts everything that will happen and why it will happen.

For example, he says that María Pérez , the European champion in Berlin last year, "will have a hard time" because when she drinks a lot of water she has stomach problems and must be controlled. Imagine that handicap with 34 degrees and more than 80% humidity. García Bragado makes a face when Pérez loses the leading group for the first time and, although he is reengaged and on the kilometer six, he tries to appear among the leaders, before the equator of the test he has already delayed until he runs out of medal options. In the end it is eighth, a position away from the medals, its objective, but enough to secure the position for the Tokyo 2020 Games.

"It was going well, but when I tried to start the stomach problems and cramps have started and I have not been able to follow the group. On the one hand I am not satisfied because I wanted the podium, but on the other hand because I get a finalist position in these conditions and it was complicated, "says Pérez, when he fulfilled one of García Bragado's prophecies, although there were more.

Another example: in the first kilometer the veteran marcher points out that the Chinese Liu Hong "must have prepared well because it is finer than ever" and that that came from being a mother just a few months ago. Chinese marchers tend to be unknown to their rivals, who never know if they arrive well or badly, but not for García Bragado. Hong indeed breaks the race and throws himself towards a gold that will be his third in the World Cups: he was already champion in 2011 and 2015. After them his compatriots Qieyang Shenjie and Yang Liujing complete a Chinese triplet that scares for Tokyo: with heat and humidity they are unbeatable.

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