Alberto Ginés López Olympic interview

You’re an olympic champion, how do you feel? (c) Lena Drapella
I'm very happy, still trying to assimilate it a bit better. We were all dreaming about the possibility of winning a gold medal when we thought about Tokyo but, honestly, I didn't see it possible at all. We came with the illusion and the objective of getting into the final. And once there, the goal was to enjoy ourselves. I don't really know how to explain the result. I think the key was that I knew how to manage the mental part well. I didn't think so much about the result or what I had to do to win, but I focused on climbing and doing my best.

How did you experience the last test of the final, the lead final?
When I finished my turn, I saw that 38+ put me first. I started to calculate to see what had to happen to win the gold, but when Jakob Schubert managed to overtake Adam Ondra, I didn't want to celebrate too much in case I had made a mistake in my calculations, I didn't want to celebrate anything too early. When I saw that it was gold, I was very happy. We are friends with Jakob, the Austrian climber, and it was very nice. It was an honour to compete against him, against Ondra and against all the climbers in the event. Just a few years ago I was watching videos and dreaming of being like them, they are legends of climbing.

Who did you think of when you saw that you won the gold?
In my family, who have always been cheering me on and supporting me, covering thousands of kilometres. And my coach, David Macià. We are a team, I couldn't do anything without him. He is 50% to blame for what we have done. I've been training with him since I was 11 years old and we understand each other very well.

Do you think this gold will help climbing to grow?
I think the fact that it is on the Olympic programme will help the community to grow a lot. It has been growing over the years and it is a very visual, very attractive sport that can get people excited. In terms of competition, what I and the rest of the guys on the Spanish national team need is a private facility so that we can work in peace and do our own training sessions and not depend on a commercial gym, where we train with clients who don't compete. It is complicated to prepare for competitions like this. Before the Games we had to go to Austria to train, for example.

Why do you like climbing?
I like climbing because it's what I've been doing since I was a little boy and, in the end, it's part of my life. Besides, I really like competing, that feeling of nerves and tension of only having one attempt and not being able to fail and the good atmosphere we have among all the climbers.