Who is Rui Oliveira, the trail sports pioneer and up-and-coming cyclist who won gold in Paris?

A pioneer on the track, Rui Oliveira confirmed the destiny he has followed since childhood in the company of his twin Ivo, with countless world and European medals and a constant “balance” between road and slope that on Saturday lifted him to Olympus.

Anyone who tells the story of Rui Oliveira inevitably tells the story of two twins with exceptional potential who spent “more than 10 years trying” to make Portugal’s Olympic track cycling debut, as the new Olympic champion told Luce in February.

When we talk about Rui, we talk about Ivo and the medals they both won, although those who practiced this aspect could be counted on the fingers of one hand. Inspired by their brother Hélder Oliveira, whom they had seen in the national peloton as children and who gave them their first bike, they set out on the road and then tried the track, where they soon discovered their potential.

Rui Oliveira’s first medal came in 2013, when he became European Junior Champion. It would be just one of many he would add to the category in the years to come: he won bronze at the 2014 Scratch and Madison World Championships, before moving up to the U23 category and winning gold at the European Elimination.

In a country where the circuit does not support anyone, the Gaia native, born on September 5, 1996, took a forked path that forced him to rush between several “talent factories”, first national (the Bairrada junior team and Liberty Seguros-Carglass of Manuel Correia) and later international.

In 2017, Rui Oliveira moved to the Akseon-Hagens Berman kennel and in his second year abroad, he attracted attention by becoming the National Under-23 Long Distance Champion as well as finishing second in the European Elimination Championships in the elite category.

The transition to professionalism happened the following season, in the “maniacal” UAE Emirates, which did not always understand the ambitions on the track of the young Portuguese, who had established himself on the road as one of the best sprinters in the world and The training program already includes five main tours.

“I want to see if I can win at least one race this year,” he told Luce days before watching victory narrowly slip away to star Wout van Aert on stage three of the Volta a Algarve.

Without ever winning for the first time in the colours of the UAE, Oliveira has hit the post on several occasions on the road – for example, he was second in the long-distance race in the last two editions of the national championship – in contrast to what happens on the velodromes, where he is a leading figure and became the European Scratch Champion (2021) and the runner-up in the European Knockout (2023).

Even in his personal life, it was this track that “dictated” the love of the current Olympic champion: Rui dated the star of New Zealand athletics, Michaela Drummond, adopted by the “gayense”, when he was in Europe.

Relaxed and cheerful – videos of him with Tadej Pogacar have gone viral – he divides his life between his old city, where he trains with his old friends – the “anonymous” members of the national team – and Andorra, the team’s “base”. Most of the WorldTour cyclists, as expected, have an unbreakable bond with his brother Ivo, who was in the stands on Saturday cheering him on.

In this Olympic dream he is living, Rui wanted to be in the company of his brother, and so he took a few days to “digest” the call for Paris 2024, with the mix of emotions he felt expressed in “the most bittersweet post ever”.

“My first call to the Olympics, which was also the debut of track cycling. Since I was little and started this sport, 99% of the races were with my brother and we grew up doing Madison, we went through a lot together and of course the culmination of the Olympic dream was his presence and with only two spots available, it was already expected that the call would be between me and him,” he wrote on Instagram.

In this post, thought out from the heart, he published the warning he had given on Saturday at the Saint-Quentin-en-Yvelines velodrome: “My comrade in arms and great friend, Flying Piggy, and I are going to do everything we can to make you all proud of Portugal.”