Intense, exciting and rowdy second running of the San Fermín bulls 2023 | Culture

Very fast (2 minutes and 23 seconds), intense, exciting and noisy was the second running of the bulls of the Sanfermines, led by the bulls of José Escolar of Avila, real athletes who ran almost 850 meters at full speed.

It was also a clean ride, so much so that the initial medical report indicates that only four people required medical attention: one with a bruised arm, another with a non-penetrating wound to one arm and it could not be confirmed that it was from a gored, and two more contusions, to the chest and skull, from trampling.

Two minutes before the initial whistle, the six bulls and six halters were already on their feet, moving their hands and legs, relaxing, sensing that something extraordinary was about to happen.

Like yesterday, the confinement clock does not coincide with the official time —it is delayed by 35 seconds—, but the first cable, aware of the accident, was already glued to the exit door before the rocket was launched. That animal and two others, experts in these fights, led the first meters of running, glued, skin to skin, to the cardinals schoolchildren, that they did not get out of their astonishment at the comings and goings of young people trying to detach themselves from the Astifino pythons in the corridors.

On that slope there were already some overwhelmed by more than one naive runner, others who had to look for a corner a few seconds before the push, and so, at full speed, the herd compacted, the animals arrived at the Plaza del Ayuntamiento and headed down the slope de Mercaderes, where a bull took the lead and dodged a collision with the planks of the Estafeta corner as best he could.

There, in this fateful spot, there were, like every morning, moments of tension promoted by the runners stationed in that forbidden area with no possibility of escaping from the push of the bulls that line the road at full speed.

There was not a cobblestone to be seen in the long Estafeta, overflowing with waiters, full of color, nerves, shifty glances, falls, stomps and, above all, the dreaded and desired closeness of pythons on the shirt. At the head of the race at that moment were three athletic bulls, all noble, mainly concerned with making their way rather than paying attention to the crowd, mostly red and white, which inexplicably blocked their way.