After all, he struggled with obstacles from an early age. At the age of ten months, in an accident at home about 400 kilometers from Sao Paulo, cooking oil was spilled on his head, which is still visible on his scarred forehead. His first sport was judo, although many predicted an athletic future for him.
“I loved judo, but there was a problem. Our family wasn’t very rich, and we saw in athletics a possibility to earn money if I got to big competitions,” he admits that at first his mind won over his heart. But he soon fell in love with athletics as well.
Alison dos Santos proved his sovereigntyPhoto: Aleksandra SzmigielReuters
He was a bit unlucky to have been born in the golden days of hurdles, as his performance in Tokyo last year would have meant gold at any previous Olympics. But even the bronze had a response in his native country dedicated to football.
“One guy told me that he and his wife watched the Olympic finals at night and they screamed so much that they woke up the whole house and got fined the next day,” he told Spikes magazine.
Now the race was at a more convenient time for the Brazilian, so there was no limit to the volume of the celebration of dos Santos’ triumph. Warholm dropped out of the battle for both the gold and the medal at the finish line, and the Brazilian triumphed in 46.29 seconds, a world championship record and the third time in history.
And he is only 22 years old… “I believe I can run even faster, but no race is perfect. But now I’m going to celebrate at the pizzeria on the athletics campus, many people have already recommended it to me,” he laughed.
