The recent triumph of Carolina Marín in the European Badminton Championship Madrid 2022 has not gone unnoticed by the jury of the Princess of Asturias Award for Sports 2022, which has selected her as one of the candidates for the award. The woman from Huelva has been selected along with 24 other athletes, including the athlete Allyson Felix, the gymnast Simone Biles and the motorcyclists Valentino Rossi and Marc Márquez, according to the president of the jury, former athlete Abel Antón. The jury issues its ruling this Wednesday in Oviedo.
The jury began deliberations on Tuesday with an “impressive” cast of applicants, according to Antón, winner of the Princess of Asturias Award for Sports in 1997 with the Spanish marathon team.
Regarding the Spanish applicants, Abel Antón has highlighted the figure of Carolina Marín, who has recently been proclaimed badminton European champion after 11 months away from the courts due to a serious injury, which “enlarges” the award.
???? Carolina Marin, VI in Europe, makes the European Championship in Madrid 2022 unforgettable.
In addition, in the list of applicants is the pilot Marc Márquez, who has been referred to as an “institution” in the field of motorcycles, along with the “reference” of Ángel Nieto.
Among the other candidates, those of the Americans Allyson Felix, an athlete specializing in sprint and relay races, and the gymnast Simone Biles, the most successful of all time in both the men’s and women’s categories, stood out.
For the man from Soriano, one of the “great favorites” and the one with his preference is Allyson Felix, the most successful athlete of all time, seven-time Olympic champion and thirteen-time world champion, to which he adds “the human component of a woman who got pregnant and had all sponsorships withdrawn at the time”.
After analyzing the twenty-four candidates that compete in this edition, Abel Antón has pointed out the international nature of the Princess of Asturias Award for Sports, which in 2022 has among its applicants a good number of foreign options, all of them with “many possibilities because they are some phenomena.
The winner to be announced this Wednesday at noon will take over from swimmer Teresa Perales, the most decorated Paralympian in history, winner of 27 medals in five games, who last year was honored with this award.
The jury in charge of choosing the winner of the 2022 Princess of Asturias Award for Sports is made up, in addition to former athlete Abel Antón, as president, and former sailor Theresa Zabell Lucas as secretary, by the president of the Spanish Olympic Committee, Alejandro Blanco, and from the Paralympic Committee, Miguel Carballeda, and the former football coach, Vicente del Bosque, among others.
Completing the list of members of the jury are personalities from the field of communication, in addition to the mountaineer Edurne Pasabán and the Paralympic champion Alberto Suárez Laso, while the director of External Relations of Real Madrid, Emilio Butragueño, and Albert Sáez have been dismissed.
