Ricardo Ten, world scratch champion

The Valencian Ricardo Tenwho broke his collarbone a month and a half ago in the World Road Championships in Alabama, won the gold medal at the Apeldoorn Track World Championships (Netherlands) in the form of scratch, one day after winning bronze in the class C1 kilometer time trial.

Ten, who until 2017 was an outstanding Paralympic swimmer, climbed to the top of the podium in scratch, winning his twenty-first world title on the bicycle at the age of 51. He crossed the finish line first ahead of China’s Weicong Liang, silver, and Malaysia’s Mohamad Yusof Hafizi Shaharuddin, bronze.

The Spanish delegation accumulates three medals in Apeldoorn, with the two metals from Ten and the title won by Alfonso Cabello, world champion for the eighth time in the class C5 kilometer time trial.

Ricardo Ten, at the age of eight, saw his life take a tremendous turn when he suffered an electrical accident that caused him to lose both arms and a leg.. He found his refuge in sport. In swimming, at the 1995 European Championship in Perpignan (France), he began a career full of success that led him to win more than one hundred titles in the water as champion of Spain, 13 European Championships, 7 World Championships, and for 15 years he was in possession of the world record for the 100-meter breaststroke class SB4 (1997-2012).

In addition, he accumulated participations in the Paralympic Games in Atlanta (1996), Sydney (2000), Beijing (2008), London (2012) and Rio de Janeiro (2016), achieving a haul of three gold medals, one silver and two bronze.