Athlete Taymara Oropesa who comes from Holguin and is considered today’s best Cuban badminton player, debuted with a victory in the individual event of the Giraldilla Tournament, that started this Thursday at Havana’s Coliseo de la Ciudad Deportiva.
Oropesa, defeated in the round of 16 2-0 (21-13, 21-16) Peruvian player Namie Miyahira and will face Priyanna Ramdhani (Guyana), in the best eight-player stage.
Previously, in the women’s doubles as a partner of Brazilian Fabiana Silva, she overcame 2-0 in the women’s doubles event, Chequeda De Boulet from Trinidad and Tobago and Ramdhani from Guyana to move worward to the quarterfinals, where they will face Cuba, athletes Angely Pita and Alina Sanz.
In the mixed doubles, Taymara will team up with Cuban Leandro Gil to face Akili Haynes and Priyanna Ramdhani of Guyana, in the best 16 stage.
The competition, which will last until Sunday 17, will award 1,700 points to the winners in each category. In the case of Oropesa, she seeks to win the individual event in her desire to qualify for the Olympic Games of Paris-2024.
Last year, Oropesa became the first Cuban woman to win a medal in the badminton event at the Pan American Games, with her bronze in the Santiago de Chile event.
Biographical summary
She was born on December 6, 1995 in the Cuban province of Holguin. Her parents, Madelaine Pupo and Alberto Oropesa, always supported her in her sports career. At the same time that she was developing her sports career, she was studying a degree in Physical Culture.
Sports career
2013 – 2016
She started playing badminton at the age of 14.
She used to play tennis, a sport in which she started at the age of eight, but being too much exposed to the sun caused her damage, and her mother asked her to look for another sport in which her health would suffer less.
That is why she chose badminton with coach José Miguel López, who assisted her until the age of 16, twelfth grade, while she remained at Holguin sports school, where she put a lot of effort and advanced quickly.
In 2014, she competed in the Central American and Caribbean Games and won the gold award, in the mixed doubles event and two bronze medals in the women’s doubles and mixed team competitions.
In 2015, she participated in the Pan American Games in Toronto, Canada, and won the mixed doubles event at Giraldilla International tournament in 2014 and 2017 with different partners.
2017 – 2019
The 2017-2018 season was for this athlete the season of most competitions. In most of them she won medals. In 2017, in the International Tournament in Suriname she won two gold medals, individually and in mixed double. In the latter modality, that year, she also reached first places in Havana’s Giraldilla tourny, in Guatemala and Santo Domingo, and second place in Mexico, together with Leodannis Martinez.
In Suriname she defeated for the first time, in three sets, in the semifinals, the champion of the last two Central American and Caribbean Games, Haramara Gaitan, from Mexico.
She also made a profitable training base in China.
In September 2018 during the IX Mexico International Badminton Tournament she defeated the defending titleholder, Jennie Gai of the United States, to win the gold medal in the singles[1].
As part of her preparation for the Pan American Games in Lima, in May 2019 she participated in the Future Series of Peru where she defeated for the first time in the singles the player from Indonesia, Ghaida Nurul
Ghaniyu with scores of 19-21,21-14, 29-27, winning the gold medal of the tournament.
In June of that same year she attended the International Badminton Tournament in Peru, where she won the silver medal after losing this time in the final of the singles against the Indonesian Ghaida Nurul Ghaniyu, who defeated her by the same score of 14-21[2].
On June 30, she won three gold medals at Guadalajara Badminton International event by winning in singles, doubles and mixed doubles (paired with Yeily Mari Ortiz and Osleni Guerrero, respectively)[3].
She was part of the Cuban badminton team for the Pan American Games of Lima 2019, where she advanced to the quarterfinals of the singles, where she lost to Rachel Honderich of Canada by 2 – 0 (21-13, 21-10). At the same stage of the tournament, she also lost in doubles (with Yeily Ortiz) and mixed doubles (with Osleni Guerrero)[4].
On July 8, at the XXIV Central American and Caribbean Games 2023, she won the silver medal in singles after being beaten by the Mexican Hamara Gaitán. [5].
- Holguin chess players grab bronze medals in Capablanca tourney - 8 de May de 2024
- Oropesa faces challenge in Pan Am Badminton Championship - 10 de April de 2024
- Holguin athlete Oropesa wins Giraldilla badminton crown - 18 de March de 2024