The best national athletes will compete from this Friday to Sunday in Valencia in it Spanish Indoor Championship which will serve as a selection for the World Cup in three weeks.
He Palau Velodrome Lluis Puig It thus hosts the first major event of this sport in the 2026 season in which the great objective for elite Spanish athletes will be the European Championships in Birmingham (United Kingdom) in August. So, in the only year of the Olympic cycle without a major outdoor world competition, This winter campaign presents the incentive of that World Cup indoor of Cuyavia and Pomerania (Kujawy Pomorze) that will be held in the Polish city of Tour of March 20th to 22nd.
And, although the deadline to obtain the minimum will be extended one more week, the bulk of the Spanish team for that event will come from what happens this weekend in the Spanish Championship short trackwhich is the official name since 2024 for this type of athletics, with a short track 200 meters rope and that is normally installed in closed pavilions.
In this case, the Valencian velodrome will host this competition for the 13th time, just a year before hosting a continental championship again under roof.
Llopis, the Valencian star
As for the protagonists, among the 550 participants, three athletes stand out who have surely been the best and most consistent of the last two seasons, hurdler Enrique Llopisthe middle distance runner Mohamed Attaoui and the long distance runner Marta García. They are among the best in the world rankings of their respective tests and have shown to be in sensational form in recent weeks.
Llopis has impressive consistency. Carry ten races of 60 m hurdles since mid-January and in all of them it has dropped below 7.58. And on two occasions he has done 7.45his new Spanish record of the test and third best world brand of the year.
Quique Llopis breaks the Spanish record of 60 m hurdles at the Madrid rally
With Asier Martínez one step behind, the Valencian can become the great idol of the local fans.
In the speed For women, special attention must be paid to the 60 m, the only distance in which another athlete will compete at a high level such as Jael Bestué; and, above all, at 400 m, one of the tests that presents the most competition with Blanca Hervás and Paula Sevilla as main contenders for the title.
By the way, this season the four —as athletes call it in slang–, like the 200, are accompanied by a novelty in the regulations: and to avoid the disadvantage of running through the interior streets in the curves – tighter than in a stadium – the number of participants per race is reduced and The final of these tests will be held in two series and the one with the best time in either of them will win.
The places in dispute in the midfield
In it half bottom The attendance is always high and on this occasion there may be more elbowing than usual in search of a great result that guarantees one of the only two places per event for athletes from a country in the World Cup in Torun. And in some distances, such as 800 m, there are already three athletes who have achieved the minimum de World Athletics: Mohamed AttaouiAdrian Ben and Elvin Joshua Canales.
Table of minimum qualification marks for the 2026 Indoor Athletics World Cup RFEA / RTVE.es
The first comes after breaking the 1,000 m world record a few weeks ago in Madrid. At that rally she also shone and surprised in the 800 in the female category Rocío Arroyowhich achieved the second best Spanish mark in history. In Valencia she will have great rivals, starting with the five-time national indoor champion Lorea Ibarzabal.
However, the spotlight will be on them Martha Garcia and his challenge of achieving the double in the two longest events of this competition, the 1,500 and the 3,000. It will have a very demanding program and aims emulate something that only one Spanish athlete, Adel Mechaal, has achieved.
In addition, there is a lot of interest in seeing the Olympic triple jump champion in action. Jordan Diazwho since Paris 2024, for one reason or another, has only made one valid jump in competition.
Likewise, another jumping competition that has raised expectations is the heightafter the performance of Pablo Martínez in the recent Spanish Under-23 Championship. The young athlete, trained by Ramón Torralbo, jumped 2.22 while competing in the heptathlon. If he confirms his progress, the Cantabrian can win again in a test that has been without a reference for many years.
Finally, in the only indoor throwing test of the program we must mention Belén Toimilwhich aspires to its sixth title in a row in this competition. It would also be the 12th consecutive Spanish championship for the Galician, also adding the outdoor championships; That is, no one has won it since the summer of 2020.
Schedule and where to see the Spanish Short Track Athletics Championship
The Spanish athletics championship short track of Valencia will be held in three days and four sessions. Starts this Friday, February 27 in the afternoon; It continues on Saturday the 28th with a double session; and ends on Sunday morning, March 1.
Schedule of the Spanish Indoor Athletics Championships 2026 RTVE.es / RFEA
The competition can be followed in full on RTVE Play and the championship will also be seen live on Teledeporte with the narration of Lourdes García Campos and Roberto Quintana and the comments of Jesús España. On RTVE.es there will also be live coverage of all the sessions and the best moments will be on Teledeporte’s social networks.
