REAL MADRID
Who has the most powerful shot in football? Fede Valverde makes the list, says expert
The Guinness Record for the most powerful kick is held by the Spaniard Javi Galán, but has Fede Valverde just broken it with his Napoli strike?
The unofficial measurements (there were no radar or lasers to verify it at the time) range from 98 km/h to 107 km/h, but what is undeniable is that the thunderbolt shot from Fede Valverde’s boot that ended in his side taking a 2-3 win in Naples was something out of the ordinary.
It was a lightning strike, a bullet from the Gods, an intergalactic rocket travelling through hyperspace that surprised everyone, the first being poor goalkeeper Meret, who barely saw the ball coming and involuntarily got the final touch as it thrashed the unsuspecting crossbar.
“Valverde has a right foot that is like a whip, when he hits it well with the middle of his instep it flies like a howitzer…” This may be the opinion of most but the person who made this comment certainly knows what he is talking about. The words come from Javi Galán, the proud owner of the Guinness World Record for the most powerful accredited shot in the world at 129 km/h. He achieved the feat in a Guinness World Record event and beat the previous effort by 20 km/h. “Fede’s shot was an utterly extraordinary screamer”, he said.
“Fede, Araújo, De Paul and Lejeune all shoot very hard…”
Who has LaLiga’s hardest shot?
Galán offers his expert vision on the question above: “It could be Valverde, also [Ronald] Araújo, I don’t know if the Uruguayans all have that clean shot in their genetics”, jokes Galán. “And Lejeune, the Rayo centre-back: I think those players are the ones who shoot the hardest”, he says. “I think that if you gave them a test like mine, maybe they could beat my record!”
Galán, who spent most of his career with El Pardo in Preferente, was a youth player for Madrid in the old Sport City that was run by World Cup winning coach, Vicente Del Bosque. Now he enjoys watching his son play, who plays for Unión Europa Sanse in Madrid, as well as watching Valverde and the rest of the league’s gunslingers.
Javi Galán’s unofficial record is 144 km/h
The origin of Javi Galán’s record was during a contest. He was 20 years old and studying Physical Education Teaching when he hit a 138 km/h shot, beating Roberto Carlos’ 121 km/h. In the Guinness Record contest, Galán had three penalty shots and the best one was 129 km/h, but his nerves from being on the stage must have influenced his performance.
“In the previous warm-up, where they let you shoot as many times as you want, I recorded 144 km/h,” he remembers. It was a source power that came from practice at the weekends “on dirt fields and hitting the Mikasa [ball]”, which “weighed like a stone.”
Years later, he had to defend his official record in Italy, like boxers who hold the world title. “I competed against a Brescia footballer and he reached 122 km/h... I did 128 km/h.” Since October 2001 he has continued to hold the record. “Now I’m 44 years old and I don’t know if I could reach 50 km/h!” he jokes. Valverde has still got some way to go.
