One keeps counting them these days. But there is one that must have hurt at Miraflores. A lot.
There were the Panamerican games in Guadalajara the last two weeks and in the final count Colombia beat Venezuela. 24 gold medals to Venezuela's 12. In silver Venezuela did better but not enough and the end result is 84-72 for Colombia. So in spite of all the Cuban trainers, all the claimed help to athletes, all the "new" training facilities, etc, etc... Venezuela cannot beat Colombia where we all know that conditions are atrocious, at least according to the chavista media.
The fact of the matter is that chavismo does not understand that sports are not just a matter of throwing money (and sponging some off in corruption). It does not matter if you have promising athletes, if they live in a shitty country, where they are worried about their security and that of their family, if they are worried about how steady would their training conditions be, well, they cannot perform as well as they could. In fact, if you ask me, I think the count in Guadalajara is higher than what it should be, probably benefiting from some lag of 3-4 years ago when there was still some hope that athletic facilities were on the mend in Venezuela.
But in a country of corrupt and fat military, you certainly cannot expect dashing athletes.... Meanwhile Colombia keeps demonstrating that at all levels it is a country in the mend, including today's election where even Uribe is starting to fade as the a new center holds sway since the Polo also faded a lot.