Cuban Olympic medalist Yaimé Pérez defects After competing at the World Athletics Championships in Oregon

The announcement on social networks of the defection in the United States of the discus thrower Yaimé Pérez has shaken Cuban sports.

Pérez, among the best discus throwers in the world since the last Olympic cycle, and bronze medalist at the Tokyo 2020 Games, left the Cuban delegation after competing in the World Athletics Championships in Eugene, Oregon, where she finished seventh.

Pérez’s alleged escape was reported by the Play Off Magazine site, which does not specify exactly where the athlete left the delegation, although some sources have assured she separated from the team during a stopover at the Miami airport on a flight from Phoenix, after leaving Oregon.

Javelin thrower Yiselena Ballar stayed in Miami on her way to Eugene from Havana. The flight of the physiotherapist of the Cuban team was also known later.

The source indicated the Cuban delegation for its return to Havana had divided into three groups, the first of these is already in Cuba, and the other two remain on U.S. soil.

Pérez, 31, is considered the most important athlete the Cuban Federation had until today, affected by an increase in the exodus of talent in recent months.

The athlete, a native of Santiago de Cuba, is a World champion in Doha and the Pan American Games in Lima, both in 2019 and has been a regular occupant of podiums in the Diamond League in the last four years. In 2018 she won the gold medal at the Central American and Caribbean Games in Barranquilla, Colombia, in 2018.

Pérez, along with four-time Greco-Roman wrestling Olympic champion Mijaín López, were Cuba’s flag bearers in Tokyo 2020. Pérez made history as the first woman flag bearer in Cuba’s Olympic history.

The Cuban sports authorities had not confirmed this Tuesday the desertion of Pérez.

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