From a good debut in a new category and a lot of study during the pandemic
‘Keep calm’. The idea was very clear from the pre-season, in line with other riders who faced the same path at the time. Such is the jump of the junior team to the U23 team. Always exciting, also in need of adaptation. Without special pressures, with certain freedom. This is how Fernando Tercero’s first year in the u23 category was drawn. The pandemic and all its consequences, however, nipped the evolution of the season in the bud.
“The truth is that a few months ago it was impossible to think that something like what we have experienced these last months would happen”, says Tercero in one of the first days of June when he starts, little by little, to go out to train on the road with some normality. “The feeling of the first days was quite strange. But the desire to go back to filming outside and the passage of days makes them immediately return to normal”.
The man from La Mancha started the season in Burguillos de Toledo, in the first edition of the Chineta Memorial, where he finished eleventh. He then went on to the Manolo Sanroma Memorial in Almagro, where he finished ninth overall. He was among those selected for Aiztondo Klasika, the third round of the Spanish Cup. But the break came.
“The beginning of the year, the truth, was quite good, even more so because it was a fairly new category for me. But it’s also true that being a first-year rider has given me some peace of mind as far as this period of confinement is concerned; there is less pressure than people with two or three more years can feel”, assesses Third.
With the establishment of the state of alarm and the restrictions on mobility that immediately affected outdoor training, the Valdepeñas rider has experienced a strange cycle: “In the confinement there were days of all kinds, a bit of a roller coaster. Days when I thought this seemed to have no end. And others, when you’re more animated. Luckily these last ones were the most”, he adds. “In my area the coronavirus hit a lot and in fact the hospital in Valdepeñas was working on the edge, fortunately no one in my immediate environment suffered any damage”.
Thirdly, she is studying Agricultural Engineering at the Ciudad Real campus of the University of Castilla-La Mancha and has taken advantage of this moment to focus on her studies. “The only good thing I’ve been able to get out of the pandemic has been the subject of books. As there are no races, and with much shorter training sessions compared to normal, I have had more time to prepare for exams and take them with more ease. So far this term, I’ve had four passes out of four exams. I have one exam left on Thursday and I’m done”.
(automatic translation, sorry for mistakes)
