CAMAGÜEY.- The boxer Julio César La Cruz and the runner Rose Mary Almanza won the awards as the best male and female athletes in this province in 2021 after the vote of the Circle of Sports Chroniclers "Gustavo Tomeu Riverón" and the local specialists of the Institute National Sports, Physical Education and Recreation. Both received the unanimous vote of those present to complete a competitive season of global relevance.

La Cruz was undefeated for ten fights in which he did not even lose a round and hung the gold medal at the Tokyo 2020 Olympics and the 2021 Belgrade Boxing World Championships.

Precisely the feat of "La Sombra" to become two-time Olympic champion and five-time champion of the world was the Event of the Year, since he ranks ours as the second most awarded fighter in Cuban history. Rose Mary made the most of it by winning the 4X400 meter event at the World Relay Championship and the 800 meter dash at the Stockholm stop of the Diamond League.

In the summer event, she ranked twelfth in the two laps to the oval and eighth in the long relay, but previously she had entered first in the athletic rallies in Guatemala and Castellón, Spain, almost always reducing the two minutes. In the category of most outstanding Paralympic athlete, the javelin player Guillermo Varona reigned, occupying the fourth seat of his modality in the Tokyo 2020 Paralympics.

Our only representative with special abilities in the land of the rising sun destroyed his personal brand until he took it a new Pan American record for category F46 (affected in upper limbs) of 63.97 meters. Experts and representatives of the specialized press discussed extensively before awarding the Rookie of the Year award to Yoenlis Hernández, the brand new world boxing titleholder in the Serbian capital.

Although he could not attend the great multidisciplinary meeting in Japan for not being the pre-Olympic in America due to the pandemic, the Esmeralda's athlete did not lose any of the ten fights he fought, including those that enshrined him as the planetary king of 75 kilograms in his first season as the first figure of the Tamers of Cuba. As Best Athlete Under Contract was selected the basketball player Yorman Polás, who entered the category at the last minute thanks to his return to the national team for the World Cup window a week ago.

The cast guard Boves, in this city, was the best defender in the German Basketball Bundesliga for the third consecutive year, this time defending the colors of MHP Riesen Ludwigsburg. With this club he led the qualifying stage of the German competition with 30 successes and only four failures, thus accessing the European Champions League.

After choosing the special awards, the list of the Ten Most Outstanding Athletes of the last twelve months was made, headed by the Olympic silver medalist in the long jump Juan Miguel Echevarría . La Guernica's “El Extraterrestre” kept landing beyond eight meters the entire time and dominated the Swedish stop at the Diamond League and athletics meetings in Germany, France and Spain.

Laura Herín, wrestling, is the only youth that was included in the selection, because in addition to winning the Pan American tournament and the I Pan American Junior Games in Cali-Valle 2021, she fought on the Tokyo mats against two of the three best gladiators on the planet. The other two athletes attending Tokyo 2020 on the list were the boxer Dainier Peró and the tripler Davisleydi Velazco , who had excellent presentations in their debuts under the five rings.

Kevin Brown completed the “team” of prize-winning fighters resulting from the fifth seat he held in Belgrade 2021 in the 67-kilogram division.

The national chess champion Carlos Daniel Albornoz also appears on his own merits, since he was an individual and collective starter in the Online Pan-American University Championship and silver in the world version of quick games. In addition, our Grand Master led the Cuban team that qualified for the final of the world contest via the internet and the World Cup in Soshi, Russia, the only face-to-face event attended by the national squad.

Baseball was represented by two aces from the mound, rights Yariel Rodríguez and Frank Madan. Yariel completed his second contract campaign with the Chunichi Dragons of the Japanese professional circuit, but he also had time to help the Camagüey Bulls in their quest to reach the postseason of the 60th National Series and represent Cuba with dignity in the regional pre-Olympic in United States. Meanwhile, Madan was the best right-handed pitcher in the Series leading important statistical departments such as innings pitched, complete games, knockouts and strikeouts and was able to wear the four letters at the Caribbean Cup in Curaçao.

The top10 was completed by two taekwondo practitioners who, given the impossibility of attending conventional events, made an extraordinary career in the Poomsae modality in open online competitions. Both Alejandro Arencibia and Pedro Pablo Escalona occupied the podiums in the traditional and freestyle sections of the Open in Havana, Argentina and Mexico. In the next meetings this December, journalists and experts from the Provincial Sports Directorate will choose the best coaches and teachers, as well as the most outstanding youth athletes.