San Fermín 2003: The Running of the Bulls
July 6 to 14, 2003. A fiesta marked by the fatal injury of a veteran Pamplona runner. Eight encierros, eight ganadérias, and a year the city would not forget.
Looking Back at 2003
Looking back at 2003, it stands as one of the darkest years in recent encierro history. A veteran Pamplona runner, Fermín Etxeberria Irañeta, suffered a fatal blow from a Cebada Gago bull on the second morning of the fiesta and never regained consciousness. He died in hospital two and a half months later, in September. The tragedy cast a long shadow over a fiesta that had eight hard mornings by any measure.
The 2003 lineup was also notable for including several of the most respected and most dangerous ganadérias in the calendar. Jandilla, Cebada Gago, and Miura were all present, and the year produced a goring on the same morning that injured both a father and his son within twenty metres of each other. The records confirm 2003 as a year that tested the course and the city in equal measure.
Dennis Clancey, Founder, Encierro
Eight Mornings, One Tragedy
The 2003 fiesta opened on July 6 with the traditional chupinazo and ran its eight encierros through July 14. The second morning, July 8, proved fatal: a Cebada Gago bull named ‘Clavelito’ struck the veteran runner Fermín Etxeberria Irañeta on Mercaderes, throwing him against the cobblestones with a severe cranial trauma. He was taken to the Hospital de Navarra, where he remained in a coma in the Intensive Care Unit for more than two months before dying on September 24, 2003.
The same year also produced one of the most extraordinary incidents in recent encierro history: a single bull gored both a father and his son in less than twenty metres during one of the runs, a coincidence of misfortune recorded by sanfermines.net and noted widely in the Spanish press. Etxeberria was 63 years old and had been running the course since he was fourteen. He was a member of the board of directors of Osasuna, the Pamplona football club, and a familiar face on the route every July.
Fermín Etxeberria had run the course since he was fourteen. He was sixty-three when the 2003 encierro caught him on Mercaderes.
Every 2003 Encierro, Day by Day
Eight runs, July 7–14, 2003. The route runs approximately 849 metres from Santo Domingo to the bull ring. See the route map.
Alcurracén
The 2003 fiesta opened with bulls from Alcurracén. The herd ran compactly and the first morning passed without horn gorings, a relatively clean start to a week that would become one of the darkest in the modern history of the encierro.
Cebada Gago
The most tragic morning of the 2003 fiesta. The Cebada Gago bull ‘Clavelito’ struck veteran Pamplona runner Fermín Etxeberria Irañeta on the Mercaderes corner, throwing him against the cobblestones with a severe cranial traumatism. Etxeberria, 63 years old and running the course since age 14, a member of Osasuna’s board of directors, never regained consciousness. He died on September 24, 2003, the fifteenth death in the documented history of the encierro since 1910.
Juan Pedro Domecq
Juan Pedro Domecq ran the third morning, one day after the fatal Cebada Gago run. One of the most frequently selected ganaderías in the modern era, the Domecq bulls are known for speed and the tendency to run in a tight pack. A clean run on a morning when the city was still in shock.
Jandilla
Jandilla, one of the signature ganaderías of the modern encierro era, ran the fourth morning. The Benaños ranch’s post-1997 history in Pamplona is defined by fast, aggressive runs, by 2003 they were establishing the goring record that would explode in 2004. The 2003 appearance passed without horn injuries.
Adolfo Martín
Adolfo Martín bulls ran the fifth encierro of the 2003 fiesta. The run came two days after the Juan Pedro Domecq encierro in which a runner sustained the fatal goring that would claim his life in September, casting a shadow over the remainder of the fiesta. The encierro continued as scheduled through its final days.
Dolores Aguirre
The Navarra ranch known for producing some of the most physically imposing bulls on the Pamplona course ran the sixth morning. The 2003 appearance passed without gorings on a fiesta that was already defined by its second morning.
Miura
Miura ran on July 13 in 2003 rather than their traditional closing Sunday slot. The Sevilla ranch, feared on the course for their size, independent temperament, and the unpredictability that has made their name synonymous with danger since the nineteenth century, provided the penultimate encierro of the fiesta.
Torrestrella
The ranch of Álvaro Domecq Diez closed the 2003 fiesta. The 2003 closer passed without gorings, and the Pobre de Mí ended a fiesta the city would carry through the long months until Etxeberria’s death in September.
The Stories the Numbers Leave Out
Fermín Etxeberria Irañeta
On 8 July 2003, the second encierro of the fiesta, a Cebada Gago bull named ‘Clavelito’ struck Fermín Etxeberria Irañeta on the Mercaderes corner, throwing him against the cobblestones with severe force. The impact caused a critical cranial traumatism. He was taken immediately to the Hospital de Navarra, where he underwent surgery and was placed in the Intensive Care Unit on artificial respiration, in a permanent coma.
Etxeberria was 63 years old and from Pamplona. He had been running the encierro since the age of fourteen and was a member of the board of directors of Club Atlético Osasuna, the city’s football club. He remained hospitalised for two and a half months. On 24 September 2003 he died at the San Juan de Dios clinic in Pamplona.
His death was the fifteenth in the documented history of the Pamplona encierro since 1910, and the first since Matthew Peter Tassio in 1995. He is the fourteenth named individual in the encierro’s fatality record. The next death in the encierro would not occur until Daniel Jimeno Romero on July 10, 2009.
San Fermín 2003: Official Cartel
Cartel: Pablo Nanclares Ruiz.
The 2003 San Fermín poster was designed by Pablo Nanclares Ruiz, selected through the Ayuntamiento de Pamplona’s annual poster competition. The winning work was chosen by a jury and announced in the spring of 2003 ahead of the July fiesta.
The full archive of San Fermín official posters from 1846 to the present is maintained by the Ayuntamiento de Pamplona, cartel archive.
Winner of the annual cartel contest and the official San Fermín 2003 poster for Sanfermines.
The City in 2003
The chupinazo opened the fiesta at noon on Saturday, July 6. The nine days of the 2003 fiesta proceeded against the backdrop of the country’s long-standing debate about the safety of the encierro, a debate that intensified sharply after July 8. Pamplona’s medical teams, the Cruz Roja de Navarra and the enferméria of the Plaza de Toros, worked through the week attending to injuries across all eight mornings.
The fiesta closed as it always does at midnight on July 14 with the candlelit Pobre de Mí in the Plaza del Castillo. The summer of 2003 also saw extreme heat across much of Europe, and the Pamplona encierro attracted its customary international attendance of runners from North America, Australia and across Europe, even as news of Etxeberria’s condition continued to circulate throughout the summer months that followed.
How 2003 Came Together
The planning and key dates, kept on the record.
The winning poster by Pablo Nanclares Ruiz was announced. The eight ganadérias were confirmed: Alcurracén, Cebada Gago, Juan Pedro Domecq, Jandilla, Adolfo Martín, Dolores Aguirre, Miura and Torrestrella.
The chupinazo opened the fiesta at noon in the Plaza del Ayuntamiento. The vallado was in place along the 849-metre route from Santo Domingo to the bullring.
The Cebada Gago encierro on Mercaderes fatally injured Fermín Etxeberria Irañeta. The bull ‘Clavelito’ knocked him to the cobblestones with a cranial impact. He was transferred immediately to the Hospital de Navarra.
The eighth and final encierro, with Torrestrella, completed the 2003 fiesta. At midnight, the Pobre de Mí ceremony in the Plaza del Castillo closed the fiesta.
Fermín Etxeberria Irañeta died at the San Juan de Dios clinic in Pamplona after spending two and a half months hospitalised. His death was the fifteenth in the documented history of the encierro.
San Fermín 2003, Answered
Was anyone killed in the 2003 San Fermín encierro?
Yes. Fermín Etxeberria Irañeta, a 63-year-old Pamplona runner and Osasuna board member who had run the encierro since age fourteen, suffered a fatal cranial injury when a Cebada Gago bull named ‘Clavelito’ struck him on Mercaderes on July 8. He died on September 24, 2003, after more than two months in a coma. His was the fifteenth death in the documented encierro record.
Which ganadérias ran in the 2003 San Fermín encierro?
The eight ganadérias were: Alcurracén (July 7), Cebada Gago (July 8), Juan Pedro Domecq (July 9), Jandilla (July 10), Adolfo Martín (July 11), Dolores Aguirre (July 12), Miura (July 13), and Torrestrella (July 14).
What was notable about the father-and-son incident in 2003?
In one of the 2003 runs, a single bull gored both a father and his son within fewer than twenty metres of each other. The coincidence was noted in the records as one of the more extraordinary incidents in the modern era of the Pamplona encierro, and is listed by sanfermines.net among the memorable unusual events in the encierro’s history.
Did an American named Ryan Jobe die at San Fermín 2003?
No. The only encierro death associated with 2003 is that of Fermín Etxeberria Irañeta, a Spanish national from Pamplona. There is no verified record in any Spanish or international source of an American runner named Ryan Jobe dying at San Fermín. The complete list of encierro fatalities, maintained by encierrosdesanfermin.com, does not include that name.
Planning your own run?
2003 is part of the record. For what followed, see San Fermín 2004, or learn the route with the runners who have studied it longest.