From Italy to Italy, from gold at the first ever European Masters Athletics Championships in Viareggio to Venice 2019. Forty-one years after, Pericles Pinto of Portugal is still enthusiastic and energetic, very keen to begin this new competition that will take off on September 5th.
He won 63 international medals in his career, starting in 1978 with gold in long jump — also as a former M40 world record holder with a leap of 7.34 — and silver in high jump, mostly until 2003. Then a break, but he came back in Aarhus two years ago.
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Now, at 82, the iconic masters athlete born in Capo Verde still declares his love for athletics: “Everyone can embrace the sport, if physically and mentally healthy, just to have fun. I will continue to train hard for the next continental event in my home country, that is preparing to host the EMA Championships Indoor in Braga 2020”. Among the others, in the Portuguese delegation welcomed at the accreditation centre in Jesolo, sprinter Ricardo Lemos and hammer thrower Vania Silva, a three-time Olympian.