Julian Retegi

Julián Retegui Barberia, known as Retegui II (born in Eratsun, Navarra on October 10, 1954), is a former Basque pelota player from Navarre. hand, the most successful of all time, considered the best in history (along with Atano III).

Biography

He is the nephew of Juan Ignacio Retegi, also a manomanista (six times winner of the manomanista championship, today he is called Retegi I). His son Julen Retegi is also a professional pelotari, under the name Retegi Bi . Since he was little, Julián was fond of playing on the pediment in his town, although in his youth he worked in a quarry and in logging. Subsequently, following the advice of his uncle, he went to the professional field after a very brief stint in amateurs, and thus in 1974 he began his career as a pelotari in the Cinema de Zarauz (Guipúzcoa) fronton, where in the company of Juaristi he was defeated by Arozena and Etxeandia for just one bit.

Injuries have been frequent during this career, the first of which was on July 5, 1978 playing against Maiz II, being forced to undergo different operations, but he managed to reap numerous successes, being number one in the discipline for more of a decade.

Among his achievements, he is the pelotari who has won the manomanista the most times, with a total of eleven (from 1980 to 1988, and also in 1990 and 1993). He also won the Second Category Manomanista in his first and only participation in 1975. He has also won five Spanish couples championships (in 1988, 1990, 1991, 1995 and 1997), one Basque Country championship for couples (in 1997) and He won four times in the Four and a Half (1989, 1990, 1991 and 1997). In this last edition he achieved his last txapela as a professional at the age of 43, after a historic match, in which he managed to come back from 17-21 against Titín III.

He was the first pelotari to achieve the three txapelas of the highest competitions of the professional hand, manomanista, hand pairs and four and a half, being at the same time the one with the most txapelas treasures in the Manomanista and in the Pairs (equaled in pairs with Maiz II and Martínez de Irujo) and surpassed in "la cage" (4 ½) only by Olaizola II. Subsequently, Fernando Arretxe, Juan Martínez de Irujo, Aimar Olaizola, Oinatz Bengoetxea, Abel Barriola, Mikel Urrutikoetxea, and Jokin Altuna have achieved this same achievement. Even in 1990 he was victorious in all three modalities, a feat only matched by Juan Martínez de Irujo in 2006 and 2014.

In recent years he worked for the baseball company Asegarce, of which television producer Karlos Arguiñano is a partner. He played his last game as a professional at the age of 47, after 27 as a professional, on September 20, 2001 at the Frontón Adarraga in Logroño, teaming up with Abel Barriola and facing off against Aimar Olaizola (rival striker whom he had been 25 years old) and Carlos Armendariz.

Family of pelotaris

Julián Retegi belongs to a dynasty of manomanista pelotaris from Erasun (Navarra). The dynasty was started by his uncle, Juan Ignacio Retegi (Retegui I), a six-time champion of the manomanista and the first Navarro to win this tournament in 1969. Other members of the Retegi family have also been professional pelotaris, such as José Mari (Retegi IV)., second-class manomanista champion in 1982. The last to reach the professional elite was his son, Julen Retegi, who should have been professionally called Retegi VII or Retegi VIII (there are discrepancies about which of these numbers would have corresponded to him) as there had previously been so many professional pelotaris who had the same last name, but the young pelotari decided to break with this tradition and baptize himself as Retegi Bi (bi means two in Basque).

Manomanist endings

Pair hand endings

(1) Etxenagusia replaced Maiz II in the final due to the latter's flu.

Finals of Four and a Half

2nd Category Manomanista Final

Awards

• Gold Medal to the Sports Merit of Navarre