Spain carries few hopes to Daegu

This has been the most trying year in history for Spanish athletics, after the Civil Guard's wide-ranging Operation Greyhound lifted the lid on the extent of doping in the sport. But eight months have passed since the police raids in December and the finest athletes in the land have continued to train and compete. On Monday, many of them left Madrid for Daegu, South Korea, the host city of the biggest meet of the year: the World Championships, which begin on Saturday and run until September 4.

Thirty hours of flight-time, with several changes, lie in store before the 44 athletes comprising the Spain team arrive in South Korea; and almost none of them expect a medal at the end of it. Marta Domínguez, the world 3,000m steeplechase champion, was arrested as part of the Greyhound investigation, then later exonerated, and became a mother in the interim; Manolo Martínez, Supermanolo, a World and European indoor shot-putt gold medalist, has retired. Mayte Martínez, bronze medalist in Osaka, is injured.

Of Spain's expedition, only Natalia Rodríguez seems confident of her chances. The Catalan 1,500m runner crossed the line first in Berlin two years ago but was disqualified for a trip on Gelete Burka. She won bronze in the European Championships in Barcelona in 2010 and has a season-best time of 4:01.5s this year, the sixth-fastest in her field. "The idea, if I arrive at 100 percent, is to win gold," she said.

Alongside Rodríguez in the final should be reigning European champion Nuria Fernández. The Madrid-born runner has had a complicated year. Her coach, Manuel Pascua, was one of the key figures in Greyhound and she has returned to her former mentor, Antonio Postigo. Isabel Macías, fifth in the Paris European Indoor Championships this year, represents the future of the distance for Spain and has a chance of reaching the final.

Digna Luz Murillo, the 100m runner, was dropped by the Spanish Athletics Federation (RFEF) for continuing to train with Pascua.

Spain is traditionally strong in middle-distance events but of the men's 1,500m competitors only Manuel Olmedo is enjoying a run of form. Climatic conditions in Daegu point to a tactical race, in which case the European indoor champion is in with a chance.

The 41-year-old 50km racewalker Jesús Ángel García Bragado, who has reaped a gold, two silvers and a bronze over the course of nine World Championships, can never be discounted even in the humidity of Daegu.

Marathon runners Chema Martínez, a European gold and silver medalist, and his comrades Pablo Villalobos, Rafael Iglesias and Alessandra Aguilar, fifth, sixth and seventh respectively in Barcelona last year, offer hope but the conditions are not entirely favorable.

Manuel Pestano, who has recorded the fifth-best discus throw of the season, will hope for better fortune than in previous tournaments while long jumper Eusebio Cáceres, 20, has the potential to add to his 2009 European Team Championships gold after recording a personal best of 8.27m in Barcelona.

World Indoor silver medalist in Doha last year, Ruth Beitia holds the Spanish indoor and outdoor high jump records but has never cleared two meters at a World Championships in the open air, a psychological rather than physical matter. At the previous Worlds in Berlin, Bragado and Domínguez were the only visitors to the podium. Seven further athletes made the finals in their disciplines, something RFEF president José María Odriozola says is the gauge of a country's track-and-field prowess.