Antonio Morgado aspires to become a “world champion” among adults.

Portugal’s Antonio Morgado took on the senior ‘World Champion’ ambition this Sunday, the day after he became U-23 world runner-up at the Road Cycling World Championships in Glasgow, Scotland.

“I would love to be world champion one day. I was second twice, let’s see if I ever manage to take the jersey, and yes, this is the goal of my career, ”said the young cyclist. two-time winner of the world championships in the background.

Antonio Morgado landed in Lisbon at 15:00 and was greeted in the arrivals area of ​​the Humberto Delgado airport with loud applause from a group of thirty people, consisting of his family and friends.

At the Under-23 World Championships, Morgado, who is only 19 years old, finished two seconds behind the new champion, Frenchman Axel Laurens, after a 168.4 km between Loch Lomond and Glasgow, which Laurens finished in 4:04.58 hours. Slovak Martin Svrcek was third.

“It took a lot of work to make it happen,” said Antonio Morgado, who finished his first year with the under-23 team and added a new medal at the World Championships after finishing second in the 2022 World Junior Championships.

The young cyclist achieved the best result among the Portuguese under 23 years old in a long-distance race. Rui Costa’s fifth place in 2008 was the previous best record, and Morgado also has the best juniors, silver in 2022.

An elite level will follow, where Rui Costa was world champion in 2013.

“It took several months, one after the other, to ride well at this stage of the season, and everything went well,” the promising cyclist congratulated after the new success and already began to look to the near future.

Antonio Morgado has already signed with the UAE Emirates and will make his debut in 2024 on the WorldTour, the high wheel of international cycling, where he wants to “learn”.

“I want to study, to learn a lot. Next year it will be difficult to achieve results and work hard. Will learn and have fun,” predicted the cyclist from Caldas da Rainha.

In the race on Saturday, the Portuguese team consisted of four other cyclists: Daniel Lima and Alexandre Montes failed to finish, while Gonçalo Tavares and Diogo Gonçalves finished in 37th and 53rd respectively.

In addition to the silver won by António Morgado, Portugal won another medal at the World Championships of the major cycling disciplines in Glasgow, won by Youri Leitao, world champion in omnium, Olympic track.

The total of two medals, to which is added the honorable performance of Nelson Oliveira in the elite time trial, who, with a sixth place, gave Portugal an additional place at the 2024 Olympics in Paris.