Born in Barcelona in 1976, to immigrant parents, he has lived in La Zarza since he was seven years old. He is married and the father of two children. Physical Education Teacher and Graduate in Sports Sciences, he is a great lover of nature, education, sports and family. He has been a teacher since 2005.
•How and when did the idea of creating the Local Sports Council arise?
The idea actually came from Francisco Javier Guerrero in the summer of 2013, who proposed the idea to me so that I could extend it to other people linked to the local sports field. The following year we were established as a non-profit sports association.
•What are your main goals?
They are multiple and diverse, such as generating physical-sports habits and activities among the population, promoting new sports modalities apart from conventional ones, having closer contact with our environmental space, collaborating with other sports associations and local institutions, disseminating sporting events and individual achievements of our athletes, publicize our environmental heritage, as well as promote collaborative and team work through volunteering in the organization of sporting events among the population. In short, promote and develop positive sporting, healthy and social values.
•What tests does the CLD organize?
The Council organizes two federated sporting events with great human and infrastructure movement, such as the Cros Solidario Villa de La Zarza Duathlon and the El Calvario de La Zarza mountain race. In addition, during these four years of life the Council has organized more than twenty activities such as: San Silvestres solidarity, aquatic gymkhana, the agricultural gymkhana without machinery on the festival of San Isidro, Baby and child duathlon, alternative sports days, talks and March against Cancer, Zarceño sports gala, clinics or technical talks, etc.
•How many members currently make up the Council?
Currently there are five people who have the most connection with the project: Rafael Barrero, Manuel Mejías, Javier Lozano, Francisco Javier Guerrero and I, but in its origins there were other people such as Jaime Guerrero, Jesús Castro, Marian Vicente and Javier García, who had to leave for work or family reasons. However, with the work of all of them in the beginning, the project began to form and generate what is today the Local Sports Council of La Zarza. From our point of view, there are too few of us for the amount of work required for the two main events mentioned above, the duathlon and the mountain race.
•What projects do you have in the short or medium term?
In the short term, the organization of the IV Duathlon Cros Solidario Villa de La Zarza 2016 that will be held on November 20, which like the previous year will once again be the Extremadura Championship, an honor and responsibility for our association.
•How do you see the sports situation in the town?
Well, everything can be improved, but if we look back it is also true that the leap has been remarkable thanks to the work of sports associations that have emerged from the personal and associative initiative of the population, such as the Peñas Blancas hiking club , the La Zarza Bike cycling club, the Archery club, judo through Zararte or the recent appearance of CD Zarceño. To these initiatives we must add the commitment and undeniable commitment of the City Council to promote sports activities through its municipal schools, as well as the promotion of sports among the youngest, the female population and adults.
I would also like to highlight the incorporation of women into competition and sport in general, as well as the number of athletes from Zarca who are federated in triathlon and mountain or practice running on the roads of the municipality as a result of the appearance of these sporting events in the municipality. .
I think, on a personal level, that the efforts are in place to develop a good physical-sports offer and together with the new facilities they turn La Zarza into a town that breathes sport, hence its recent award as the best local sports entity in the region.
•What do you think can be improved in La Zarza in the sports section?
I believe that the pending issue is found in the adolescent population between 12 and 18 years old, who do not consider physical-sports habits a priority within their free time, and it will not be due to a lack of effort on the part of everyone to make it possible.
We must try to get this adolescent population to carry out some activity on a regular basis outside of their academic sphere. To do this, the local political parties should sit down and configure an annual plan of activities in connection with those responsible for education in that age group (Institute and Ampa) to, together, analyze and promote healthy physical habits so that their children have free time to practice sports. But I understand that this requires a lot of effort and involvement on the part of all groups and, above all, time. I understand that the company is difficult, but not impossible, at least it could be tried and experimented.
•How is the CLD financed?
We do not have fixed aid, but rather the specific financial aid offered by the City Council to the two large competitive tests that we carry out, as well as other occasional aid from the Badajoz Provincial Council. We also receive help in material and infrastructure from the General Directorate of Sports of the Government of Extremadura and its sponsors, some cash income through sponsorships from companies and private entities in the town, and finally, from fees. of athletes participating in federated events.
•What difficulties does the Council currently encounter?
The main difficulties are the few people who are in charge of the Council and the demands of the federations when organizing sporting events.
I take this opportunity to appeal to those people who want to join our project to be able to continue all these activities in a less stressful way. Organizing an activity between five people is not the same as organizing an activity between fifteen or twenty.
•What have been your greatest satisfactions throughout these years at the head of the CLD?
Our greatest satisfaction has been seeing the large number of people who selflessly collaborate as volunteers in all the sporting events we organize. We greatly value the people who go alone for three hours to a remote point in the mountains or mountains to control the test, the cooks, those who control the streets, etc. and they miss the finish area. And of course, we must also highlight the permanent help of Civil Protection, Local Police and City Council.
We have always said it, we all make people and we all make La Zarza, of which we should be very proud.
In addition, we also feel very comforted by the comments of the participants, which highlight the great atmosphere that is breathed in them, the collaboration and attention of the volunteers, as well as the landscape of our surroundings.
•How do you see the future of the Council?
At the moment, the future is the IV Duathlon Cros Solidario Villa de La Zarza, speaking further is difficult because we are involved in the preparations for this test, but we are very clear that we need to incorporate people into the project so that it continues to have viability and permanence over time.
•What are the most rewarding activities you have done during these five years?
I would highlight, without a doubt, two: the Baby duathlon of 2014, in which more than 170 children participated in the Sports City and the First March against Cancer, because it constituted the first stone to consolidate this solidarity activity that Aoex has organized since then. and that also marked the union of the color pink to the La Zarza duathlon.