Ona Carbonell is retiring

Author: Europe Press

Spanish swimmer She Carbonellformer captain of the synchronized national team, announced this Friday that he is retiring after more than 20 years in the elite and after participating in three Olympic Games, where he added silver and bronze, along with another 34 medals between world and European.

The Barcelona swimmer celebrated medals at the Games, the World and European Games in many artistic disciplines, from the first medal won at the World Cup in Melbourne (Asutralia) in 2007. The bronze in the technical team that opened the successful path of the Catalan woman, who now leaves the professional practice of synchronization at the age at the age of 32 and after a break from her career, she became a mother.

Carbonell can boast that she is the woman with the most medals in the history of the swimming world championships and one of the most successful Spanish athletes. Her 23 medals at world cups, the last three of which were at the competition in South Korea in 2019, rank her at the top of synchronized swimming, now artistic, but also at the top of all swimming modalities.

The Barcelona player surpassed the historic Natalia Ischenko in World Cup medals, with 21 medals between 2005 and 2015, and also left behind a siren who blew up the synchro in Spain; Gemma Mengual — won 20 medals at the World Cup —. In addition, he remained in third place on the list of absolute world medals, behind Ryan Lochte (27) and Michael Phelps (33).

The former captain of the national team, only two years after her debut, she established herself in the national team, starting to collect 23 medals from the World Cup and 12 continental medals that she won, along with two Olympic medals.

His big moment came in 2012, when he played his first Games, when he won silver in a spectacular duet with Andre Fuentes, now the coach of the United States and then the leader of the Spanish team, after taking over from Mengual and giving him, shortly after , the very Carbonell.

Also, on that London rendezvous Carbonell also won bronze, in the team routine, in one of the best moments of his career. He had a total of three Olympic experiences, since he was in Rio 2016, where he competed without a medal (and with controversy surrounding the result) together with the historic Gemma Mengual, and Tokyo 2020, where he started, without even knowing it, to say goodbye.

His farewell leaves a huge void in Spanish artistic swimming, as there is currently no key relay in the water for Carbonell. So far, the sweet and quick transitions between Mengual, Fuentes and Carbonello seem to have had no clear continuity, although with his help the team has given way to a new generation that, without the pressure of victory, hopes to return to the medals soon.

Mother of two children, Ona Carbonell is an example of effort and improvement, the flag of an exceptional generation that admired the most important swimming pools around the planet. The Catalan woman, who announced her temporary retirement in 2020 in order to devote herself to her family, also showed her competitiveness and talent in the kitchens of the RTVE MasterChef Celebrity program, in which she won in 2018.