The power of a paralympic legacy based on well-structured actions was made clear during the Rio 2106 event in the performance of the U.K's team, which finished second in the overall medal tally.

The U.K delegation doubled the number of gold medals it won in comparison with its home event, London 2012, when it finished in third place.

However, no explanation seems to be convincing enough to account for the results achieved by the Brazilian delegation, the biggest to participate in the competition to date with 287 athletes, and which received the largest financial support (nearly R$ 400 million -US$ 120 million- in four years) and which had the opportunity to take advantage of the support of its fans, who filled the arenas.

In comparison with the London event (21 gold medals), in Rio, Brazil won just 14.

However, Brazil did not manage to achieve the goal of finishing among the top five, as it finished in eighth place, and saw its biggest stars, with the exception of Daniel Dias, fall as they committed technical errors, were defeated by foreigners or even due to their emotional instability as they were no capable of dealing with the pressure.

Sports that gave Brazil gold medals in the past or those in which Brazilians had been paralympic or world champions, such as bocce ball, fencing and judo, disappointed the fans.

The country, however, managed to achieve important historic marks, such as the total number of medals won - the previous record had been in the Beijing Games (47) and hiked to 71 in Rio.

The increase in the total number of medals shows that the competitiveness of the new sports such as table tennis, equestrianism and canoeing is growing.

Translated by THOMAS MUELLO

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