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Lima –
With its half-built houses stacked on the side of a hill and some bullet peals from time to time, Chacrinha does not seem very different from other favelas in Rio de Janeiro.
What makes it unique in the football paradise is to be the birthplace of Ygor Coelho de Oliveira, the only Brazilian who on Friday reached the Pan-American gold by hitting a feather.
Ygor surprised in Lima as the exotic Latin American who got between representatives of Canada and the United States in the finals of the male badminton branch.
At the close, he defeated Canadian Bryan Yang 2-0, in a duel in which he won from the first goal. Thus, he also overcame his farewell in the quarterfinals in Toronto-2015.
"It's the most important medal," he says, already standing, after celebrating on his knees clenching his fists.
"It is the first badminton gold medal in history (from Brazil). I feel very honored to be able to represent the country," he adds, with the hope that his achievement will boost the development of sport in the country.
A rare bug'
His never goes unnoticed. It is also a 'weirdo' in the league of Denmark, where he has been playing for two years, and is the first on this side of the world in the global badminton ranking.
The ball slows in the air after a racket of his opponent of Asian features. Ygor jumps and accelerates the swing in a shot that sticks in the opposite field. Always on guard, the Brazilian moves his almost 1.80 m along the green outline and with calculated blows.
The 22-year-old from Rio de Janeiro fused in the cold of the Nordic country to refine her movements. Technique, concentration and, above all, patience, lists among his learnings to achieve the solid game that gave him the victory.
There, in addition, "he became a citizen of the world; he is like a fish in the water," says his coach and "guardian angel" Gwenaelle Maitre.Â
Ygor speaks English, begins to botch the local language and even rehearsed some words in Mandarin Chinese when speaking to the press at the National Sports Village of Lima.
In the Peruvian capital he beat singles to players from El Salvador (2-0), Cuba (2-0), United States (2-0) and Canada (2-1), before returning to face the final with another of the North American exponents.
Ygor received hugs from his Danish instructor and his teammates from the national team, who previously achieved doubles bronzes.
"His dream as a child was to be a Pan-American champion, and I feel he is now more prepared, more mature, playing big championships, to win gold," Marco Pereira Vasconcelos anticipated before the definition. , one of the coaches of the Brazilian team.
Flight without slides
The first time he got on a plane, he just wanted to throw himself down the slide drawn in the booklet he pulled out of the drawer in the seat, Maitre recalls.
But in his career there were only more flights: Ygor won six Pan American championships to devote himself the best of his time in the Junior category.
He took his first steps in the sport for his father, Sebastiao Dias de Oliveira, who started a social project in 1998 to get kids away from the dangers of violence and drugs in Chacrinha, a community of 5,000 inhabitants in the west of the city.Â
"My friends entered that kind of life and some of them died," he said in an interview a while ago.
According to Pereira Vasconcelos, "Ygor wants to affirm the sport. He comes from a favela and has left poverty, but he never forgets his origins. That is his greatest strength."
In the previous of the last game, the breath came to him by WhastApp from Chacrinha. In what is now a gym, a group of boys jump and shout their name in chorus. At the beginning of Ygor, that place was barely a concrete beach where he played barefoot.
"He is a very warrior 'menino' who was behind his dream. He wants to be among the best in the world, conquer the world despite coming from a community and being a reference for Brazil," says Maitre.
In Chacrinha it was a Friday of celebration. (D)
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