Meet Hugo Calderano, the Brazilian vegetarian table tennis star who speaks seven languages and can solve a Rubik’s Cube in nine seconds | Sport-others News

He speaks seven languages, can solve a Rubik’s Cube in nine seconds on average, and can name the capital of every country.Brazilian 27-year-old Hugo Calderano may be a mental wizard now but at the age of 13, he had to make a potentially life-altering decision.
With his parents being physical education teachers, he was into various sports but excelled at two – volleyball and table tennis. They backed him to become a professional athlete, but asked him to pick one sport and focus on it.
Being Brazilian, they perhaps thought he would pick volleyball, the country’s second-most popular sport after football. After all, he had participated in regular competitions and was even drafted into the state team while on the other hand, there weren’t too many top Brazilian star paddlers he could look up to.
However, even at the age of 13, Hugo wasn’t afraid to take the path less taken. He chose table tennis and decided to devote his life to it. His parents, though apprehensive, weren’t too worried about it. They trusted their son, who stunningly, at the age of 4, taught himself to read and write.

Scorcher alert ⚠️
Here’s Hugo Calderano at his very best 💯#WTTGoa #WTTStarContender #PingPong #TableTennis pic.twitter.com/O7SOmuxfNy
— World Table Tennis (@WTTGlobal) January 26, 2024
He moved cities, and then continents, in his quest to become one of the best in the world. And he has.
While he’s the first-ever player from South America to reach the Top 10 of the ITTF World Rankings, he’s the only non-Asian or European to be in the world’s top 10 for at least the past six years.
On Sunday, in the final of the WTT Star Contender against 17-year-old French sensation Felix Lebrun, Calderano led two games before Felix fought back to win the match 4-2. Though heartbroken after the loss, Calderano posed for selfies with fans and talked to the waiting media.
“No shame in losing, I’m disappointed but have to deal with this,” he said.
Taking the path less treaded threw up difficulties very early in his career that he never imagined would arise. Like when he was 14, he had to leave his hometown Rio de Janeiro to live in Sao Caetano do Sul and practise with the Brazilian national team. His 80-year-old grandfather Antonio moved with him and helped him adapt to his new life.
Being a professional in a sport that had no tradition in his country also had advantages, he says. Like he wasn’t constrained to a single school of thought.
“Because I don’t come from table tennis, I was able to develop my game based on other characterics, other aspects of sport in general,” he had said.

Striving for improvement
It may be true for most top sportspersons, but it’s his desire to constantly evolve and take risks that sets Calderano apart.
In 2014, despite winning a bronze at the Youth Olympics, he recognised that he needed much more exposure to reach the level he desired, so as a 17-year-old, he moved continents to play for a top-tier club in the German Bundesliga (Ochsenhausen).
Moving to Germany and competing with the best helped Calderano raise his game. So when he won his first gold in singles at the Pan American Games, it didn’t come as a surprise.
No South American player even comes close to his achievements. He’s a three-time continental champion and a three-time Pan American Championship winner.
While he lost in the Round of 16 at his home Olympics in 2016, Calderano says his performance caught the eye of the Brazilian public.
Brazil’s Hugo Calderano celebrates after winning the men’s singles semi-finals clash at the WTT Star Contender Goa 2024 at the Peddem Indoor Stadium in Mapusa, Goa on Sunday, January 28, 2024. (File)
“Brazilian people are very passionate and follow their sportspersons. After seeing me do well at the Olympics, I think the sport has grown in Brazil and I’m happy for that,” he told The Indian Express.
Calderano knows that come the Paris Olympics, the pressure will be on him again as a representative of not only Brazil but of South America as a whole. Having had an excellent 2023 season, reaching the semifinals of the Singapore Smash and winning the WTT Contender events in Durban, Doha and Muscat, apart from winning the Pan American Games and the Pan American Championships, he’s confident of doing well against the Chinese favourites.
“I’m training myself for it. I think it’s possible,” he says.
Calderano is not leaving any stone unturned in working towards that goal and is ready to do anything that could improve his game. Like when he turned vegetarian about six years ago just because he believed it would help him recover quickly.
“It’s becoming easier to be a vegetarian in Brazil and Europe but I love India because of this,” he says with a laugh, going on to say that dal makhani, chana masala and garlic naan are the Indian foods he just can’t say no to.
He’s worked tremendously on the mental aspect as well.

During the pandemic, being in lockdown was probably the toughest test, but he managed to get through it learning to play the guitar and the ukelele. Learning to solve the Rubik’s Cube in seconds was part of his mental training while he says he learnt to speak different languages (Portuguese, English, Spanish, German, Mandarin, French and Italian) just so he doesn’t have to depend on anyone.
Playing the guitar may help him unwind, but he hopes to write his own lyrics and be on song at the Paris Games.