Elite athletes: ten names that left their mark

Panama’s sporting history is stellar. Ball players, sprinters, boxers, swimmers and footballers are some of the nation’s many icons whose passion for sports is undiminished. Here are some names you should remember.

1. Julio Cesar “Dely” Valdes
Called the best Panamanian footballer of all time, he started his career in Panama’s Atlético Colón, but became famous for Uruguayan Nacional, with whom he won the title of champion there in 1992. Then followed the long-awaited jump to Europe, where he wore the jersey of four clubs between 1993 and 2003. ., which makes him currently the favorite of the bookies in Panama. In his European tour, he won two championships: the Cup Winners’ Cup in 1996 and the Intertoto Cup in 2002.

2. Charlotte Gooden
The sprinter from the capital became the first Olympic flag bearer in 1960, after becoming the first woman from the Isthmus to win three medals at the Pan American Games. His triumphal journey began at the age of 15 with the Bolivarians from Caracas in 1951, where he won gold medals. For many years he triumphed in Central America and the Caribbean in Mexico.

3. Lloyd Labeach
This sprinter was the first Panamanian athlete to climb onto the Olympic podium. At the Olympic Games in London in 1948, he won a bronze medal. His two medals were considered achievements by the Panamanian government, awarding him the “Vasco Núñez de Balboa” order.

4. Eileen Marie Coparropa
This swimmer, nicknamed the Little Golden Mermaid, is reputed to be the most famous Panamanian athlete in history. In Central America and the Caribbean, she began to be considered the “queen of speed” because in seven years she set 11 regional records in the 50 and 100 meter freestyle.

5. Marlene Worthington
One of the top athletes of the past years, she shone in one of the most difficult sports: fencing. He excelled at various regional games, starting from the 1954 Central American and Caribbean Games in Mexico, to the 1973 Central American Games in Guatemala, when he bid farewell to international competition, with two individual and team gold medals.

6. Diva bishop
One of the unforgettable sprinters that Panama had in the 70s. She started her journey in Bolivarians Maracaiba in 1970, and in 1973 she was the queen of the track, winning five gold medals, three of them individually. He won individually in the 100 and 200 meter races, the high jump and overall in the relay.

7.Rod Carew
He is considered one of the best hitters in Major League history, and because of the public interest his life is generating. His seven offensive titles landed him in the Hall of Fame, in Cooperstown, NY, where he was inducted in 1991. He is the only Panamanian to date, winning Rookie of the Year in 1997 and, ten years later, Most Valuable Player.

8. Daisy Martinez
A sprinter who started his international career at the age of 14 in 1968, when he won a bronze medal in the classical century at the ‘Memorial Barrientos’ in Havana. At the regional level, Margarita won silver medals at the Central American and Caribbean Games in Panama in 1970 and Santo Domingo in 1974.

9. Teófilo “Panama Al Brown”
Recognized as the first Latin American boxer to win a professional world title, for his victory over the Spaniard Vidal Gregorio in June 1929. He made eleven successful title defenses, in different European cities, until he relinquished the crown, in 1935, in Valencia, against the Spaniard Baltasar Sangchili.

10. Judith Caballero
A multidisciplinary athlete, he won four medals at the Central American and Caribbean Games and another at the Pan American Games. At the Central American Games in Barranquilla in 1946, she won gold medals in discus and javelin and another bronze medal in women’s basketball. Four years later, at the Games in Guatemala, he won gold in javelin throwing, and at the first Pan American Games in Buenos Aires in 1951, he repeated the gold in the same discipline.