Heformer Cuban jumper Ivan Pedroso He has become one of the most successful coaches in recent times in that discipline and has five world-class athletes as disciples, including Olympic and world champion Yulimar Rojas and to hisSpanish nationalized countryman Jordan Díaz.
Pedroso's work as a builder of top-level jumpers is indisputable, since in addition to the current world record holder and Díaz, he has the French triple jumper under his tutelageTeddy Tamgho, Spanish-styleAna Peleteiro Brión and to PortugueseNelson Évora.
According to a text published byThe country and replicated by the siteVenezuelan Faces, it all started six years ago when Rojas decided to send the Cuban, known forhis nickname of The Grasshopper. In the text, the South American athlete, who was only 18 years old at the time, told him that he was her idol and that she wanted him to be her coach.
“I didn't know if he knew me, if he had seen me in any competition. Before writing to you I was afraid because, wow! Ivan Pedroso! I was nobody, I had no titles, but I thought that the worst thing that could happen to me was that he wouldn't answer me," Rojas said.
He also reported that the Cuban champion's first response was very satisfactory, as he said that he knew her and that he was impressed with her talent and abilities. "Then we got more specific, he offered me to go train in Spain with him and when I arrived... I still remember the first time he shook my hand," he added.
Pedroso's academy is located in the Spanish city of Guadalajara, a few kilometers from Madrid. It only took three months in that place for the Venezuelan to begin to surpass her previous records and from marking 13.54 meters at the 2014 Central American and Caribbean Games she went on to jump 14.14 in Lima, where she obtained the runner-up position in South America.
In 2016 she became the main rival of the Colombian Catherine Ibarguen and even achieved an Olympic silver in Rio de Janeiro that allowed specialists to predict the future she has today. 2020 arrived and the pandemic caused the delay of the Olympic Games in Tokyo, so Pedroso made good use of the time to fine-tune the Venezuelan and Peleteiro.
Rojas won gold and set the world record, while the Spanish also surprised the world with a historic bronze medal that turned the former Cuban jumper into a very proud coach. Peleteiro was very grateful and thanked the legendary Caribbean athlete.
The stellar 25-year-old Galician athleteHe remembered how much he has evolved since he started training with Pedroso, Olympic long jump gold in Sydney 2000 and four-time world champion.
"Iván has been the person who has trusted me, who has taken me out of absolute shit, from a girl who weighed 65 kilos, who had excess fat everywhere, a talent that was broken. She was a broken toy, literally. He trusted me, grabbed me and told me: 'We are going to do it. I don't know if it will be here, in five or ten years, I don't know when it will be, but we are going to do something big together,' he said a few days before the appointment. the five rings.
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