Las carreras populares en la Barcelona de la transición política (1975-1982)

With the Spanish political transition (1975-1982) a period of deep transformations began, which also affected the real sport situation of the country. In the case of Barcelona, athletic races had an important growth among the population, becoming a sporting event feature of this period. With its popular nature, these races were permeated by constituent elements of the time, such as the wish for freedom or democracy. This article is focused on the analysis of popular races in Barcelona as a demonstration of the transformations that the sporting event experienced during the political transition and also as an event from which we can understand some of the constituent elements of the social and political situation of that time. The methodology used has been the interpretive analysis of secondary sources and newspaper records. In this respect, it is possible to differentiate two periods: The first one (1975-1978) allowed for the appearance of the first races of a festive and participative nature, while in the period (1979-1982) it experienced growth and consolidation. Some of the reasons of this expansion were the appearance of new races as well as offfield elements and the organizational cooperation between the different sports agents of the city.