Pablo Herrera, Sebastian Mora and Thierry Ndikumwenayo will represent Villarreal at the big sporting event
Villarreal will have three representatives at the 2024 Olympic Games to be held from 26th July to 11th August in Paris (France). Pablo Herrera, Sebastián Mora and Thierry Ndikumwenayo, athletes belonging to the Endavant Esports programme through which the club sponsors various clubs and athletes from the province of Castellón with the aim of collaborating in the growth and promotion of elite sport in the province of Castellón, will be fighting for glory at the international multi-sport event.
The following are the athletes belonging to the Endavant Esports programme who will be competing in Paris:
Pablo Herrera (beach volleyball)
With his participation in the 2024 Olympic Games, the player from Castellón will hold the record of being the beach volleyball player with the most participations in Olympic events. In fact, Paris will be his sixth, and last, Games.
Only two more Spanish athletes have participated in the Olympics than him: the race walker Jesús Ángel García Bragado (8) and the canoeist Teresa Portela (in Paris she will take part in her seventh Games).
Pablo Herrera was the first athlete to belong to Endavant Esports, being one of the few Olympic medallists from the province. The athlete from Castellón made history at the 2004 Athens Olympics by winning the silver medal and was later European champion in 2013 and 2015.
Sebastián Mora (track cycling)
The cyclist from Vila-real will be taking part in his third Olympic Games, competing in the madison (endurance relay) and omnium (a compendium of four events: scratch, tempo, elimination and points race). He was also an Olympian at London 2012 and Tokyo 2020, achieving two creditable sixth places.
Mora’s greatest achievements are having been world champion in 2016 in the scratch race and six times European champion in 2015 (scratch and madison), 2016 (madison), 2019 (scratch) and 2020 (points, madison and omnium). This will be his third appearance at the Olympic Games, competing in the madison and omnium events.
Thierry Ndikumwenayo (athletics)
The athlete, born in Burundi, has been representing Spain since 2023. Paris will be his first Olympic Games, competing in the 5,000m and 10,000m events. It is worth mentioning that he obtained the qualifying standard for the latter distance with a time of 27:26.57, the fourth best Spanish time of all time.
The international athlete, a specialist in long-distance and cross-country running, started in this sport at the age of 16 and his greatest successes have been winning the gold medal in the 5,000m race at the European Games and the bronze medal in the 10,000m race at the European Athletics Championships in Rome.
