• Direct. Last minute about the coronavirus
  • Taymory: From making sportswear to multiplying robes and masks

The caged lynx. "And I am young, healthy and strong. What am I doing locked up here? I needed to help." So many times Javier Castillejo got off the ropes, so many times he shook the stands with that courage that made him a legend of home boxing. Like that night in Leganés, when the 15,000 souls that crowded La Cover exploded when he defeated the American Keith Mullings, with the world title that returned to Spain 22 years later. Javi's 'escape' this time is to give back part of all that other people's love, to support his people in Parla now that they need him like never before: "It was time to put my shoulder on it."

The world champion does not drop his rings. With his Red Cross vest he goes from house to house, distributing the order of food to those who cannot, and, above all, to those who should not go out. "'Champion, what are you doing here!', Someone surprises me when he recognizes me behind the mask. And it moves you. Because it is very sad, it distresses me. Seeing them locked up there, with that loneliness. Because the worst is loneliness. You keep thinking all day, "admits Castillejo, retired from the ring just 11 years ago.

"They are admirable people, because psychologically you have to be very strong to endure this. People who are alone, who are older, who have their relatives far away, who are afraid when they see the news." And that's why the Lynx goes, takes note of the list, with the coupons of 30 euros donated by Carrefour, and makes the purchase. And then delivery, door to door, between surprises and cute scenes, like when they want to tip you . To him, who caressed the glory that June night at the MGM in Las Vegas against Óscar de la Hoya. Or before, when more than three million Spaniards saw Telecinco fight at dawn against Julio César Vásquez. He, who knew so much about the value of the experience, as when he was underestimated and, at 38 years old, surprised Felix Sturm in Germany - the country where Javi grew up - to conquer the world middleweight title. "The old man can still pupate a lot," he used to warn in those days.

"With these politicians ..."

The world champion, the only Spaniard to achieve it in two categories (superwelter and a half), did not hesitate to make himself fully available. Because he knows well of humble people, of difficult beginnings, of low blows of life. Fat brush painter when boxing was not enough to make ends meet. "I have collaborated with the Red Cross for a long time, I volunteered in its day . But now it was more necessary than ever. I thought about how I could help people in this situation, who have given me so much when I was on the ring ", he affirms from his house, where he spends the quarantine in family, reading," exercising the body and the mind ".

Castillejo, in front of his office computer. EL MUNDO

And, as one more, he responds to the solidarity quadrant when it is his turn, several mornings a week. "They make the orders and we take them house to house. To the elderly, sick or disabled ...", from his Parla, where now his gym is also a sea of ​​silences, closed to the wall since the beginning of the alarm status. And that, the 200 kids at school , many of them young people at risk of exclusion who have a unique escape route in the ring, also eats the Lynx inside. "The greatest courage of the human being is to stay on his feet, even when he is falling apart," reads a premonitory sign at the entrance.

"The economic impact of all this is going to be harder than the disease. And with these politicians who do not agree ... It will be so difficult," he laments. "This is serious, it is very serious. This is harder than boxing." It is like a 12 round match and we are only going for the sixth. And the thing is there, there, "he laments." But beware, we will win by KO in the last round, "concludes the champion hopefully, who always was also from life.

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