Guillermo Hermoso de Mendoza cuts a generous tail and marks the distance

Rejoneador Guillermo Hermoso de Mendoza, who cut the tail of the last bull in this Sunday's bullfight, managed to maintain the family legacy on the afternoon of bullfighting on horseback during the San Fermin festival, which for the first time in 27 years did not feature the name of his father, Pablo Hermoso de Mendoza, on the posters.

That legacy, which the great rider from Estella cultivated for almost three decades in a plaza initially unfamiliar to bullfighting, was taken up today by his son Guillermo to bring the best of a corrida to the monumental Pamplona bullring in which several bulls from the Niño de la Capea brand made things easy for the riders.

And especially the sixth, Veleto by name, who galloped tirelessly behind the mounts of the young dynastic rider in a vibrant performance and with which he marked a wide difference with his companions, since against the bravery of the bull he opposed the composure and courage of Berlin, the star of his stable, on which he tempered it, reduced it and broke it with adjustment in a great third of banderillas, in which the hermosinas patented by his father were not lacking. After a pair of two-handed passes from the inside on Generoso , also very close, the culmination of the performance came with a rear rejonazo that had a devastating effect in just a few seconds, thus unleashing the somewhat excessive request for the tail that granted the presidency, at the same time as the well-deserved return to the ring to the bull from Carmen Lorenzo.

Previously, Guillermo had cut off the first ear from the third bull , which he reserved with less depth but which he knew how to perfectly excite with the rump of his horses to keep it a little longer in a fight that the Navarrese carried out with skill to end up parading that benevolent trophy.

Another ear went to fellow Navarrese Roberto Armendáriz, specifically after his work with the fourth bull of the afternoon, which threatened to give way in the first third but ended up improving with the banderillas, albeit without much stability. The local rider handled it with the same correctness and minimal adjustment he applied to the opening bull, which, with its fine build, was one of the most outstanding bulls. With both, Armendáriz also resorted to removing the headstall from one of his star horses, the chestnut Rubí, only by using a cable around the horse's neck, and instead of using two hands, he placed a single banderilla in each encounter, with plenty of space between the bull and the horse. Only the greater success with the rejón de muerte (killing rejon) in his second bull motivated the request and granting of that lightweight ear.

And Lea Vicens left empty-handed, who, despite enjoying the crowd's favor, had a poor afternoon in her debut in Pamplona. After her first bull was rendered useless almost at the start when it hit a burladero, with the change of the substitute, the Frenchwoman ended up fighting two El Capea bulls, both with mobility and dedication. Even so, the French rider handled both bulls better than she did when it came to fighting and exciting them than she did when it came to placing banderillas, with false passes, poor adjustment, and repeated errors. She also abused the work of her assistants with the cape, especially when preparing the bulls to go in for the kill, when she also missed repeatedly. And all this despite the fact that, with a bit of relief, she managed to complete a lap of the ring on her own with her first bull.