Video | Armando Roca, the record man against time

When Armando Roca broke the Spanish record for the 100 meter dash, the Beatles did not yet exist, the human being had not reached the moon and Philips projected the world premiere of the first cassette tapes.

Shortly after, Roca was also champion in the 200 and 4x100, the other two great speed tests.

Now, more than half a century later, in the age of smartphones and 5G networks, this Catalan architect continues to challenge the limits of his body on tartan.

He does it every week in Tolosa (Gipuzkoa), a city that dazzled him and where he has lived and trained since 1962, when at a rally for the Spanish team he met his wife, Mercedes Ceberio, a worker at the concentration hotel in the where the national team was staying.

“For my husband, athletics comes first;

second, the family;

and third, the architecture,” she says.

And she adds: “The day Armando has to leave him… An absolute family drama.

I don't even want to know!"

César Roca, son of Armando, is also his coach.

With a degree in Physical Activity and Sports Sciences, he assures that his relationship with his father on the track is very fluid: “There is no dispute.

There is a very special complicity between father and son in each training session”.

In addition, he says, his father is always the one who pulls the binomial: “Whenever a competition ends, he starts talking to me about the next one.

He always looks to the future.”

Winner of dozens of metals in many championships, Armando Roca was an absolute international with Spain on 14 occasions.

Now, on his way to 88 springs, he looks back from his beloved Tolosa and reflects: “What gives your body to run 30 or 40 meters at full speed is something everlasting.

It's reliving years and years in a moment.

For me, it's the same feeling as when I was 15."

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