Sotomayor is ‘godfather’ of the ‘Salsa Mayor’ band

Havana: The gold chain and bracelets, red Mercedes Benz and the 12-man salsa band suggest a mover and shaker of Havana nightlife, not the world’s record-holding high jumper. These days you are more likely to find Javier Sotomayor standing at a bar rather than leaping to clear one.

The former athlete’s band ‘Salsa Mayor’ plays the matinee show on Tuesdays at the Casa de la Musica in downtown Havana, to a crowd of rhythmically gyrating dancers.

“I’m the godfather of the band,” Sotomayor said below the stands of Havana’s dilapidated Pan-American Stadium, as the trombone and the conga drums echo through the empty building in a warm-up for the band’s daily practice.

Sotomayor put up some of his prize-money from athletics to buy instruments. His friend and former wrestler Roberto Despaigne, who plays guitar and writes the songs, selected the players, all professionals.

The salsa band is more than a hobby for Sotomayor. The athlete turned budding musical impresario is looking for a recording company while doing gigs for tourists at a hotel on one of Cuba’s sun-bathed Caribbean keys.

It has been more than a decade since the lanky Cuban made history by clearing 2.45 metres on his second attempt one summer day of 1993 in Salamanca, Spain. No athlete has come close to that mark.

“Some day they will. It’s a law of life. But there is nobody threatening the record at the moment,” the 36-year-old Sotomayor said.

The Olympic record set by American Charles Austin at the 1996 Atlanta Games stands at 2.39 metres, six centimetres lower. Austin holds the United States record of 2.40 while Sotomayor has the world indoor mark at 2.43.

The 1.94-m Sotomayor retired in 2001 under a cloud of controversy. At the 1999 Pan-American Games in Winnipeg, the athlete tested positive for cocaine and was sent home in disgrace.

Cuban leader Fidel Castro personally defended Sotomayor as a hero of Cuba’s socialist sports system and said he was the victim of bungled laboratory work.

In a controversial ruling, the International Association of Athletics Federations (IAAF) exceptionally reduced his suspension from two years to one and Sotomayor was able to compete in the 2000 Olympics in Sydney, coming away with the silver medal, even though he jumped only 2.32.

He had won the gold at the Barcelona Olympics with a leap of 2.34, a moment of joy the athlete said was as unforgettable as the birth of his two sons. The last time he cleared 2.40 was at the Pan-American Games in Mar del Plata, Argentina, in 1995. No one has jumped higher since.

Sotomayor said injury forced his retirement, not the doping scandal. An Achilles tendon problem hampered his performance and reduced his run-up from nine steps to seven and then just five.

“The Cuban federation never accepted the positive test, much less do I,” he said.

But three months before retiring, he failed a random dope test for nandrolone at a meeting in Tenerife, in the Canary Islands.

The IAAF never ratified the test result and Sotomayor avoided getting a life ban.

“What I miss most is competing, and even more when I see today’s marks,” he said.

But Sotomayor’s record is never far away from him. The number plate of his Mercedes C-180, a prize for his gold medal at the 1993 world championships in Stuttgart, ends in the digits 245. (Reuters)