Features
LUN 20.06.2016
Everything began back in Shanghai in June 2014, where Villarreal CF and the Spanish women's water polo team joined forces under the auspices of the LaLiga World programme, as the recently crowned 2012 Olympic Games silver medallists, 2013 world champions and the 2014 European champions travelled around China with the Yellow Submarine. During the course of their tour of the Asian country, the Villarreal squad made the most of the opportunity to learn from the world's leading water polo stars, who this summer will once again be gracing the Olympic Games.
However, Villarreal were not the only Spanish side who were on their travels in the summer of 2014. At the end of July, UD Almeria were out in Bangkok with the Spanish badminton team, which included European champion, Carolina Marin. Speaking on 30th July 2014, Marin revealed that the LaLiga-organised tour would allow her to "gain an insight into the performance levels of the Thai players and help to prepare to win a medal at the next World Championships, something that I'll be able to achieve thanks to the LaLiga World programme." Just one month on from that conversation, on the 31st August, the Andalusian was crowned world champion for the first time in her career. All that's now missing from Marin's collection is an Olympic gold and the 23-year-old will be going all out in Rio to set that particular record straight.
Whilst the Almeria players were sharing experiences with the badminton team, the Spanish women's hockey team were over in California with Atletico Madrid. In one of the highlights of the Stateside stay, stars from both teams enjoyed being given a taster of each other's sports, before reverting back to more familiar territory. The Red Sticks are also poised to line up alongside Carolina Marin and the women's water polo team at this summer's Rio Games.
In August 2015, Shanghai once again played host to an exchange between LaLiga's footballing stars and their counterparts from other sports. On this occasion, the LaLiga World initiative brought together the Spanish table tennis team and Atletico Madrid. Amongst the table tennis stars taking part was Yanfei Shen, who in October 2015 would go on to become a European champion, marking the very first time that a Spaniard had taken to the podium at a European Table Tennis Championships. Shen is another former LaLiga World participant who heads to Rio in search of glory this summer.
The latest Spanish representatives to have sealed their place at Rio 2016 are the men's rugby sevens team. The Rio Games will represent the first time that the sport features at an Olympics and Spain will be part of the lineup after having overcome Samoa. Los Leones booked their place in Rio a month on from having teamed up with Real Sociedad in another instalment of the LaLiga World project. Whilst they were over in the United States, the players spoke to us of their ambitions of clinching the only remaining sevens berth and one month later, their dreams have come true.
© LALIGA - 2016