Pascua moves from track to green

An unmistakable figure was seen this week walking around the El Encín golf course, which is hosting the Madrid Masters from October 6 to 9. It is impossible not to recognize Manuel Pascua, the track and field coach implicated in the Operation Greyhound investigation into doping.

Sitting on a bench, wearing his habitual vest, sports shoes and hat, Pascua, 78, is waiting for his latest pupil, the golfer Ignacio Garrido, who has employed the controversial coach for the 2011 season.

"He was recommended to me, of course, and I'm very happy with him," says the 39-year-old Garrido, a professional since 1993 and son of Antonio Garrido, who, with Severiano Ballesteros, was the first non-Briton to represent Europe in the Ryder Cup. "Pascua knows the elite sportsman like nobody else. He has changed me." Garrido started training with Pascua at the beginning of the year. "Yes, when Operation Greyhound was in full flow. But he has demonstrated that he is innocent of everything he has been accused of. Nothing has been proven. But the damage is done. It's like taking a cushion, ripping it up and throwing all the feathers on the floor. Later someone will want to pick them up, but it's too late."

Pascua has been banned by the Spanish Athletics Federation from training athletes with grants from the governing body, and is also prohibited from entering the Blume high-performance center in Madrid. He was questioned by the Civil Guard after empty blood transfusion bags were found in his house and Pascua later admitted that he had doped some of his athletes, including middle distance runners Reyes Estévez and Nuria Fernández.

The case against Pascua for his involvement with the Operation Greyhound doping ring remains open. Meanwhile, controversy continues to hound him. Last June, the sprinter Digna Luz Murillo was excluded from the Spain team for the European Championships after images of her training with Pascua came to light.

But in spite of Pascua's past he has found a new niche in golf, a sport that was revolutionized at the highest level when Tiger Woods exploded onto the scene in the late 1990s. The Californian brought to an end the stereotype of unfit players and made physical training a trend. Today, all of the world's professionals spend as much time in the gym as they do working on technical and mental preparation.

"Every coach has his own way of working," says Garrido. "Manuel has a lot of experience. With him, I have improved a lot physically and mentally. I had knee problems and back pain, now I'm much better. We have done abdominal work, stretching... He is unlike any other coach. There are 50,000 ways in which he is different."

Garrido has played in 24 tournaments this year and his best results were fifth place at the Irish Open in July and eighth at Gleneagles in August. Over the past 18 years he has played 455 competitions, with two victories at the German Open in 1997, when he was also selected for the Ryder Cup team, and the Volvo PGA in 2003. He has amassed 267,348 euros so far this season and, over the entire course of his career, almost 6.3 million euros. "Now I feel in good condition," he says. "My season has improved from the beginning, when I had a few injuries and my game wouldn't get going. But later in the year I felt much better and now I want to round off the season. The objective is to consolidate my results."

And does working with a coach of Pascua's reputation not... "Reputation? One thing is what people say and another is what is true. For example, the police have been accused of falsifying evidence. There is a lot of jealousy in sport when somebody is doing well. And a lot of sensationalism."