Jaël-Sakura Bestué: "I do not want to be a public figure. I want to be a doctor, in the end"

BarcelonaShe collects successes on the athletics track, but on her WhatsApp, she has a photograph from when she went to do medical volunteering with a friend in Sri Lanka. Jaël-Sakura Bestué, in fact, confesses that she does not consider herself an athlete by nature, even though the bronze medal she won in Europe this August with the 4x100m mixed relay (with the best Spanish record) is still fresh in her mind. But she is also passionate about music and the prospect of becoming a doctor when she finishes her degree.

Once you are the woman who runs the 200 meters fastest in history in Spain, do you continue to build yourself as an athlete?

— Never stop doing it. Now I am going out to compete abroad a lot and that gives me international experience that I didn't have before. Each time we have more strength, each time we perfect the start more... The 200 meters have the turn part and the straight part, and you look at how to take advantage of everything. Also technology: the shoes change and you have to adapt to them. You work very much to the millimeter.

Until, after months of training, the race arrives. In those 22 seconds and a few tenths, what goes through your mind?

— One thing I work on with my psychologist is trying to be super focused. 22 seconds seems like a short time, but there is time to think a lot. Too much! And I need to not think about anything other than doing what I am doing. Because if you start thinking, oh, the technique, oh if I am placing my foot correctly or if I sense my rival behind me... I doubt. And I cannot afford that.

Is the concentration muscle the hardest to master?

— In the end, when you run with people who are better than you, you see them pass by your side... it's complicated not to let it affect you. You have to try to be with yourself and that's enough.

Is all the sacrifice worth it to risk it all in just over 22 seconds?

— Training sessions are a lot of fun. It is demanding and tough, agreed, but then the 200m competition is not as hard as the 800 meters, for example. The bad part, of course, is that you effectively stake everything in a very short time. And the start is a very decisive moment. In the end, you train for so many days, from Monday to Saturday, to prove it all in a heartbeat.

You are almost finishing your medical degree. From the mesh to the stethoscope, that really is an Olympic leap!

— At home they always told me to study something. I don't want to limit myself only to athletics, because, besides, sport isn't something I love either, you know?

Excuse me?!

— I have a good time running and I love athletics. But I'm not a sportsgirl, you know? There are many other things that interest me, such as music. As a child I was at the conservatory, playing the sax for several years, and I also loved it. I don't want to close myself off, I suppose.

And why medicine?

— I wanted a long career that I would enjoy. I suppose that in my early 30s I will have to retire and I wanted to have a plan B for the rest of my life. I would like to be a cardiologist and study certain congenital heart diseases, but I am open to exploring more things. I am a curious person and I would adapt to whatever life puts in front of me, really.

Can you make a living from athletics?

— While you are competing at this level, yes, but you have to save in order to be calmer in the future. You rely on sponsors, of course. And once your career is over, you cannot rely much on your image either; not that many people know you. When you are competing you have a certain moment of attention, but if in two weeks they forget about you, imagine when you retire.

Many athletes cultivate their personal image on social networks to have a persona that survives their sports career. It does not seem like a path that calls to you.

— Indeed. I do not want to be a public figure, I want to be a doctor, in the end. But it is true that the better I sell myself on social media, the more doors can open and they can even help my future side as a doctor, if they give me access to do some project. But I do not exploit it to the maximum like other athletes.

Are you already thinking about the 2028 Olympic Games?

— This year I am handling it quite well and I think I have serious options to go. With the previous Games I felt a lot of pressure. I was not getting results, the training sessions were very demanding... Physically I was not well and mentally, neither. On the other hand, this year I am super healthy.

Have you ever thought about throwing in the towel?

— In 2021, at 20 years old, I had hip surgery and the situation pushed me to the limit. I recovered well, I went to the Tokyo Games and set a personal best, but a year later I relapsed with the same pain. They couldn't find a solution and they proposed another operation that would have been much more aggressive and which did not make it very viable to continue doing athletics. That was when my mother said to me: “Jaël, we really love this, but if you have to consider quitting, it's okay too”.

Luckily, that was not the case.

— I had a pretty hard time, but thanks to the physios and my coach, who saw it as possible, I started a neural treatment and moved forward.

As a racialized person, have you ever encountered any unpleasant comments?

— Yes, I have encountered it, especially when we go to the Games. Since there is more visibility, people who are not from the athletics circle give their opinion and then there are many comments that refer to one's origin. Before, it affected me a lot. Before.

Your personal best is 22.19 seconds. Isn't it obsessive, shaving off a few hundredths?

— Of course! My second best mark is 22.40. That's two tenths above! (Laughs) But what do I do? Do I get frustrated for not returning to that best version of myself from that day, when the conditions and the wind were like that? Or do I compare myself with my second mark, and set more realistic goals for myself? I am for realistic goals. This season I have been running at 22.57 and that is five tenths above, but I am very calm and happy. Now, it is complicated to manage, because in the end we are measured by a number.

You've told me what you think about during the 22 seconds of the race. And during the 22 seconds before?

— Oh! These are the worst, the worst! That moment is very tense because you go out, you see all the people, you get ready in the starting blocks and you think: in 23 seconds I will have already run and I don't know how it will have gone. It is the most tense moment of my life. They introduce us one by one, and you wave, but inside you are still thinking, please, I want to run, I want to run! Then you hear the starting voice and the whole stadium goes silent. And I think: everyone must be able to hear my heart.