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Touched by grace, Molano also wins in Zipaquirá
The fabulous Higuita never ceases to amaze, and more and more
Bogotá is a beast, a city monster, noise, cars, pollution, that on Sunday, the day of the bike lanes, from the hills that enclose it and force it to look upwards, it looks like a kitten that purrs and lets itself be caressed, so sweet. It is in the hills, in its forests, in Montserrate, in Guadalupe, touching the sky, where the monster lives, where the beast acts, where Sergio Andrés Higuita, a cyclist from Medellín, triumphs.
His fans go crazy, dance, shout at the Castilla Commune, so soccer, so from the other Higuita in the neighborhood, the Scorpion René, like when the national scores a goal, how they shouted when he won a stage in the Vuelta, like when, two years ago Sundays he won the national champion jersey in Tunja, and proudly show his shirt, shake his cap, his teachings, his war name, monster (monster) , with which he was baptized in California by the patron of his team, Jonathan Vaughters, his insignia, the head of a crowned lion.
And to all that Higuita does honor, and at the height of the Verjón, at 3,290 meters, it raises the reproduction of the Poporo Quimbaya, the beautiful and unique trophy that recognizes him as champion of the Tour Colombia. .
No one is surprised anymore. Higuita has earned respect and applause, and everyone admits that he is one of the greats of world cycling, so tiny in size (1.68m, 58 kilos), with so much dynamite on his legs, with so much strength on his head, So well furnished. Until recently, however, the only one who was not surprised by his successes was Higuita himself, who nothing, less than a year ago, was still running at the Euskadi Foundation, where he had to demonstrate his quality for four months before in May After that, he was hired by EF, the WorldTour team that, thanks to the initial time trial, copied the final podium with Higuita, Martínez and Ecuadorian Caicedo.
“Yes, I had in mind wanting to achieve what I have achieved so far,” said Higuita four days ago. “Since I was youthful or pre-youthful and I made so many efforts, I sat down to analyze and I wondered 'when will the reward come', because sometimes I didn't see very clearly what I was doing because I was trying so hard. Now I know that the reward has arrived. These are times to keep progressing, not to lose my ambition, because I'm young and I'm just beginning to build my story. ”
The Tour Colombia, so recent, completes its third year a medal winners, Egan Superman, Higuita, who envy other races of more tradition and prestige.
World cycling congratulates, fantasy to power, youth. The first exaltation of an almost 22-year-old boy who, after the victory in El Verjón of his teammate Daniel Martínez, is proclaimed the best of the general of a race in which one day, in the magical arrival of Santa Rosa de Viterbo, defeated three of the best cyclists in the world thrown to death by him: the Frenchman Alaphilippe, untouchable in that type of stages in the Tour in hard arrivals, of repechos; the Ecuadorian Richard Carapaz, winner of the Giro and possessor of a punch of great boxer, and the great Egan, winner of the Tour.
And it is Egan, precisely, the 23-year-old already consecrated, who, helped by Carapaz, fights until the end against all the untouchable EF, happy and comfortable at his wheel all the tended ascent from the streets of Bogotá. The champion of the Tour, of Zipaquirá, where the stage came from, thus shows his commitment, his sense of duty to a tremendous hobby, which invades everything, that celebrates everything, that is stirred in the gutters. “I came to the Tour Colombia and I wanted to make her calm, but, juicy, there are many people who come here to see me run,” says Egan, who, despite everything, finishes third in the stage and fourth in the general. “I feel that responsibility to be Tour champion, and I try to do my best. That is good for me and it is also good for them. ”
And good for all is also the emergence of Higuita in a world scene that is increasingly Colombian and that makes old, mandatory new stanzas, the song of Carlos Vives that extolled everyone, except Superman, from the origins of Colombian cycling until the generation of Nairo and Rigo. You will have to add Egan, Dani Martínez, Gaviria, Molano, and Higuita.
"For me it was a blessing Postobón", says the new jewel talking about its origins in the very young professionalism, at the age of 18, by the hand of Luis Fernando Saldarriaga in a structure that already disappeared and whose hollow is still hollow, and at 16, 17, young people travel to Europe fed by illusions, alone. “It was a team that took me, that opened the doors for me, I learned three years, and with the discipline of a team that knew what I was going to do, right? They scolded you for what you did wrong and that is very important. ”
His past everyone knows him: the dreaming boy who studies, who trains, who helps his father, Leonardo, a locksmith who invents a device to transport him and his bicycle on his little motorcycle; that at the age of 11 he promises his mother, Marlene, that one day he will arrive by bicycle to true Paris, to France, not to neighboring Paris, the neighborhood at the foot of his Commune of combos and invisible borders; that at 15 he is already with his longtime girlfriend, Laura. “Since I was a child I have loved cycling, I am still the same child who started cycling, who did not sleep before the races of emotion, of craving, and I feel the same now,” he says. “I know that this feeling comes from loving cycling, that if it were just a job I would not have so much emotion to compete, to enjoy, to be in what I always wanted when I was little and I watched videos on the Internet of the Tour, of the Tour, I Uff said, that's a dream. And even though I am now one of them, I still have the thrill of running next to the big ones. I still feel a lot of happiness, love and passion. ”
His qualities describe them: “I have always been a very courageous cyclist. There are cyclists who are very good by nature. Your body has been designed for the bicycle. But I am a cyclist of efforts, of courage , of training well, of taking care of myself, of persevering. ”
His future proclaims it, and he knows it long: “I have in mind being a runner of hard classics. I would like to win the Walloon Arrow and Lombardy, someday. And also make a podium in a big one. Winning a big Tour or Tour is very difficult, but I think I have the possibility to do it. I have seen that I have the capabilities. I do not want to strive to achieve great results now but to go step by step learning, improving year after year, going up one step, going up another, and creating a long story, that at 35, 36, remains equally passionate, just as good , and wanting to be riding a bicycle with the same passion now. ”
He talks and talks, and everyone looks at him, and they say, amen, monster.
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