The pride of the athlete is malevolent, uncontrollable, because it motivates or brakes, according to the mood, but it takes unexplored territories to satisfy primary desires, such as defeating in a semifinal of a World Cup at the hottest half -back test, the last two years. “I have finally won Wanyonyi,” says Torrelavega athlete as soon as he leaves half the world with his mouth open because of the way he has won the semifinal that has classified him for the end of Saturday (15.22). Departure, Attaoui, 23 years old until a week, is lagging behind. He passes through the bell at 51,36s, a second later, five or six meters, that the Frenchman Meziane, who has assumed the duty to launch the race. 200 meters from the goal, it is still sixth, just over half a second from the Tshepiso Masalela Botsuano, one of the figures of the moment, which decides to launch the sprint long. That tries, because who really launches the long sprint is Attaaui, which advances everyone on the right in the last curve, running more meters but with more free space, and when it reaches the final stretch and looks back only sees the void and a squad headed by the great Wanyonyi nothing less in furious persecution, and useless. “I told myself, I’m not going to let it happen to me, suppose what it supposes,” he says. “I feel very good, brutal. Of course pride is important.” And also the numbers: the 100 meters in curve after their change travels them in 89 hundredths less than Wanyonyi, a world to the best.
When he explains, Attaoui, who reaches his second final one year after that of the Paris Games, speaks like those who, in a state of grace, do everything so well that they surprise themselves, and seeing him run, so easy, his change, that it is a silent bomb, one imagines that he is driving a car so good that he never reaches his maximum speed. “I told myself, I’m going to change a little, I’m going to wait here until the last straight, but I have found myself again free and said, come, with everything. And when I have looked and I have seen that I had a hole, I said, come, until the end, it has been an incredible feeling. I am great, great.” And it rains, with what he likes to run in the rain.
Attaaui ran the last 200m at 25.35s, more than a faster second than Wanyonyi. He won with 1m 43,18s. It was the fastest semifinal and the freshness of Cantabrian movements that only a part of his body, the hands, which opens to the maximum in the exit position, and its end, reminded the way he achieved two weeks ago the third best mark in the history of 1,000m (2m 12,25s) after the 2m 11.96s of Noah Ngeny and the 2m 12.18s of Sebastian Coe. The most important thing: he ran the last 200m in a second less than his illustrious predecessors, 26.45s, a time that leaves those who understand, who remember that it is not the same to finish an 800, with the lactate already by the clouds, and add 200m, to add them to a 600m, when fatigue has not yet shot. “Yes, we knew that 1,000m could run well, since it is an 800m corridor with great aerobic resistance,” explained the ATTAUI coach, “it is a good impulse for Moha before the World Cup, but obviously in the World Cup there are many great athletes and the depth in the 800m is greater than ever. We have to make intelligent decisions first in the preliminary round and in the semifinal, and then we will see!”
Since Adrián Ben broke the void in the 2019 World Cup, the Spanish 800m, until then, has only stopped participating in a grand finale, that of Oregon 2022. Ben also played the Tokyo Olympic final and that of the World Cup in Paris. Attaaui relieved him in Paris, where he was fifth, and a year later, he says, in Tokyo no longer is worth participating. He wants to win. “The final? It will be the last race of the season. I will run it to death and try to be high. Without fear already for all,” he says before an appointment that will have revenge air, because in it he will find five of his rivals in the French capital, the first three, Wanyonyi, Sedjati and Aroup, in addition to Burgin and Masalela. Spanish athletics has not yet won a track test in a World Cup.
