Carles Castillejo Salvador (born August 18, 1978 in

Barcelona Barcelona ( , , ) is a city on the coast of northeastern Spain. It is the capital and largest city of the autonomous community of Catalonia, as well as the second most populous municipality of Spain. With a population of 1.6 million within ...

) is a Spanish long distance runner. He has won Spanish national titles in the 5000 m, the 10,000 m and the

marathon The marathon is a long-distance foot race with a distance of , usually run as a road race, but the distance can be covered on trail routes. The marathon can be completed by running or with a run/walk strategy. There are also wheelchair di ...

. He has represented Spain at the Olympics on four occasions (2004, 2008, 2012 and 2016).

Biography

He made his first international appearances for Spain in 2004. He ran in the long race at the

2004 IAAF World Cross Country Championships The 2004 IAAF World Cross Country Championships took place on March 20/21, 2004. The races were held at the Ossegem Park in Brussels, the capital of Belgium. Reports of the event were given in ''The New York Times'', and for the IAAF World ...

and finished in 57th place.Castillejo Carles

IAAF World Athletics, formerly known as the International Amateur Athletic Federation (from 1912 to 2001) and International Association of Athletics Federations (from 2001 to 2019, both abbreviated as the IAAF) is the international governing body fo ...

. Retrieved on 2012-02-12. He had greater success on the track: he won the national title over

5000 metres The 5000 metres or 5000-metre run is a common long-distance running event in track and field, approximately equivalent to or . It is one of the track events in the Olympic Games and the World Championships in Athletics, run over laps of a sta ...

and was a close second to

Hudson de Souza Hudson Santos de Souza (born February 25, 1977) is a Brazilian middle-distance runner who competes mostly over 1500 metres. He has broken a number of South American records in middle-distance events. He has won twice at the South American C ...

over

3000 metres The 3000 metres or 3000-metre run is a track running event, also commonly known as the "3K" or "3K run", where 7.5 laps are run around an outdoor 400 m track, or 15 laps around a 200 m indoor track. It is debated whether the 3000m shoul ...

at the

2004 Ibero-American Championships in Athletics The 2004 Ibero-American Championships in Athletics (''Spanish: XI Campeonato Iberoamericano de Atletismo'') was the eleventh edition of the international athletics competition between Ibero-American nations which was held at the Estadio Iberoam ...

. His Olympic debut followed at the

2004 Athens Olympics The 2004 Summer Olympics ( el, Θερινοί Ολυμπιακοί Αγώνες 2004, ), officially the Games of the XXVIII Olympiad ( el, Αγώνες της 28ης Ολυμπιάδας, ) and also known as Athens 2004 ( el, Αθήνα 2004), ...

, but he was eliminated in the heats of the 5000 m.Carles Castillejo
Sports Reference. Retrieved on 2012-02-12. In 2005, he improved to 26th place in the World Cross Country long race. He also ran a

10,000 metres The 10,000 metres or the 10,000-metre run is a common long-distance track running event. The event is part of the athletics programme at the Olympic Games and the World Athletics Championships, and is common at championship level events. The ra ...

personal best of 28:06.88 minutes to take second place at the

European Cup 10000m The European 10,000m Cup is an annual 10,000 metres race for European athletes which was first held in 1997. The competition is organised by the European Athletics Association and first began as the European 10000 Metres Challenge (''European 1 ...

. The following year he ranked 29th at the World Cross Country and helped Spain to the team silver medals at the

2006 European Cross Country Championships The 13th European Cross Country Championships were held at San Giorgio su Legnano in Italy on 10 December 2006. Mo Farah took the title in the men's competition, while Tetyana Holovchenko won the women's race. Results Men individual 9.95 km ...

with a tenth-place finish. He continued to perform well at the European Cup 10000m, taking the bronze in 2007 and silver in 2008. After running a personal best of 27:39.79 minutes in Vigo, he ran in the event at the

2008 Beijing Olympics The 2008 Summer Olympics (), officially the Games of the XXIX Olympiad () and also known as Beijing 2008 (), were an international multisport event held from 8 to 24 August 2008, in Beijing, China. A total of 10,942 athletes from 204 Nati ...

and managed 23rd place overall. He had a career best finish of 26th at the

2009 IAAF World Cross Country Championships 9 (nine) is the natural number following and preceding . Evolution of the Arabic digit In the beginning, various Indians wrote a digit 9 similar in shape to the modern closing question mark without the bottom dot. The Kshatrapa, Andhra and ...

, then went on to claim the silver medal over 5000 m at the

2009 European Team Championships The first European Athletics Team Championships took place on 20 and 21 June 2009. The track and field athletics tournament run by European Athletics was the successor of the old European Cup competition which was held annually until 2008. The Ch ...

. His best performance on the world stage followed, as he came 15th in the 10,000 m at the

2009 World Championships in Athletics The 12th IAAF World Championships in Athletics () were held in Berlin, Germany from 15–23 August 2009. The majority of events took place in the Olympiastadion, while the marathon and racewalking events started and finished at the Brandenbur ...

. The highlight of his 2010 season was a fifth-place finish in the 10,000 m at the

European Championships The European Championships is a multi-sport tournament which brings together the existing European Championships of some of the continent's leading sports every four years. The inaugural edition in 2018 was staged by the host cities of Berlin, ...

. Castillejo made his debut over the

distance in 2011 at the national championship race held at the Maratón Ciudad de Castellón. He won the race with a time of 2:10:02 hours – a performance which guaranteed him selection for the 2012 Summer Olympics. He defeated

Patrick Makau Patrick Makau Musyoki (born 2 March 1985) is a runner from Kenya. He is a former world record holder in the marathon—His time of 2:03:38, run at the 2011 Berlin Marathon, was the world record for two years, until it was beaten by Wilson Kipsang ...

(the marathon world record holder) at the 2012

Granollers Half Marathon The Granollers Half Marathon (Catalan: ''Mitja Marató de Granollers'') is an annual road running competition over the half marathon distance (21.097 km) which takes place in February in the city of Granollers in Catalonia, Spain. The race is ...

in February, where he performed well in near-freezing conditions. At the 2012 Summer Olympics, he finished in 24th place. In Río Olympics 2016 he finished 49th with a time of 2h18m34s, his last marathon as a professional.

Achievements

References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Castillejo, Carles 1978 births Living people Spanish male long-distance runners Spanish male marathon runners Athletes (track and field) at the 2004 Summer Olympics Athletes (track and field) at the 2008 Summer Olympics Athletes (track and field) at the 2012 Summer Olympics Olympic athletes for Spain Athletes from Barcelona World Athletics Championships athletes for Spain Mediterranean Games silver medalists for Spain Mediterranean Games medalists in athletics Athletes (track and field) at the 2005 Mediterranean Games Competitors at the 2003 Summer Universiade Competitors at the 2005 Summer Universiade