Rayo Cantabria

Rayo Cantabria was founded in 1926 as Gimnástica de Miranda, later being renamed Sociedad Deportiva Rayo Cantabria. Having competed independently in the Cantabrian Regional Championship, in 1946 they were promoted to the third tier of Spanish football, the old Tercera División, for the first time; the following campaign, they faced the biggest local club Racing de Santander (or Real Santander as they were known at the time), Rayo being relegated and Racing promoted. In the 1950–51 Tercera División season, Rayo came up against the Racing youth team, Juventud RS with both entering the relegating playoffs; Juventud went down and folded soon after, and from that time Rayo became the Racing farm team. They went on to spend 20 consecutive years at the third level, coming close to promotion on a few occasions, also performing the important task in developing young local players, some of whom (including Paco Gento, Marquitos, Ico Aguilar, Pedro Zaballa, Vicente Miera and Nando Yosu) went on to great success. They temporarily disassociated from Racing in the 1968–69 and 1969–70 seasons when both were in the same division. After league restructuring in the mid-1970s, Rayo played just one further season at the third level (now Segunda División B) – that was in 1987–88, and they were relegated. Further elite players produced via a spell in the team included Tuto Sañudo, Juan Carlos, Manolo Preciado, Pedro Munitis and José María Ceballos. In 1993 the original Rayo was dissolved in a…

Tercera División (3rd tier): 1960–61 Tercera División (4th tier): 1986–87, 1994–95, 1998–99, 2004–05 Copa Federación de España: 1998–99