the mutual admiration society

Some of La Roja’s biggest fans are also some of Spain’s best athletes!

Shortly after winning Wimbledon, Rafa Nadal flew to South Africa to watch the World Cup final, decked out in a Spain shirt, a Spanish flag, and not one, but two bufandas!  He also had the Spanish flag painted on both cheeks.  Vamos Rafa!

And Rafa’s fellow tennis player Fernando Verdasco wore a specially modified La Roja shirt during a Davis Cup match.

Meanwhile, during the BMW Open on June 25 (left), Sergio García wore a Spain shirt while on the course.  And at the St. Andrews Open on July 16 (right), he wore a red shirt with a star on it to commemorate the fact that Spain’s jerseys will carry one star from now on (click picture to enlarge).

And during a rest day on the Tour de France on July 12, Alberto Contador put on Spain’s shirt and showed off his football skills.  He would go on to win the race yesterday, so ¡enhorabuena campeón!

Something else these three star athletes have in common, besides supporting Spain and excelling in their respective fields – they’re all Real Madrid fans as well!  Sergio García has shown his love like this, while Rafa has done this, and here are some pictures I took of Alberto Contador taking the saque de honor in the game against Xerez at the Bernabéu last year (he’s the one in the suit.  Sorry for my photography skills, those refs got in the way).  Another Spain and Madrid fan, Fernando Alonso, won the German Grand Prix yesterday, so congratulations to him as well!

And we all know how the footballers feel about these boys!  Álvaro Arbeloa loves it as well – check out his tweets on Fernando Alonso and Alberto Contador.

Update: reader Lidwika points out that Dani Pedrosa also wore a Spain shirt after winning the Germany Moto Grand Prix on July 18.  To his right is Jorge Lorenzo, who got into a bit of a tiff with unamadridista favorite Alejandro Sanz over twitter on this very subject.