Friends and training partners on Sesi (Industry Social Service) athletics tracks for over a decade, Piracicabano Erik Cardoso and the American Felipe Bardi are the two fastest men in Brazil.
They are the only athletes in the country running 100 meters in less than ten seconds.
Classified to the Tokyo World Cup in September, the duo has set as a goal to renew their personal records in a difficult competition away from home, against the best in the world, then thinking of taking Brazil to the final and ending a 34 -year -old hiatus.
“Let’s go up, trying our best to get a good race,” Cardoso told Sheet. “It is a challenge to enter the competition and do your best, which you are prepared to do in training, to be able to realize in the competition,” added the sprinter.
Friend’s godfather Bardi said the partnership between the two helps in the development of both, both inside and outside the tracks.
“We have always been helping each other, exchanging experiences about what we could improve. In competitions, as much as we were rivals, running side by side in the rays, we never fail to hug and cheer for each other,” he said.
“Despite the rivalry inside the track, wanting to earn, making good marks and breaking records, our friendship has always prevailed outside it,” said Cardoso. “A help in the evolution of the other. He is pulling me to be better, and I’m pulling too.”
With a one-and-a-half age difference, Cardoso, 25, and Bardi, 26, met teenagers when they started training together at Sesi de Piracicaba in 2014. Three years later, they went to train in Santo André.
Since then, they have collected state, national, South American and Pan American titles in the grassroots and adult categories.
The two were champions together in the 4 x 100 m relay test at the Pan Americans of Santiago, in November 2023, in a formation that also had Rodrigo Nascimento and Renan Gallina.
A few months before the medal, on July 28, Cardoso had become the first Brazilian to run below ten seconds, completing the distance in 9s97 in the South American and beat Robson Caetano’s 10S record, established in 1988.
On September 9, 2023, it was Bardi’s turn to download the brand in 0s01. Silver at 100 m in Pan de Santiago and with the participation in two Olympics (Tokyo-2020 and Paris-2024) in the curriculum, he had already run in 9s97, but time was not approved because of winds above 2 m/s, limit to validating records.
The brand lasted until July 31, when Cardoso made 9s93 to cross first at the Brazil trophy. With the performance, he recovered the Brazilian and South American records and guaranteed a presence at the Japan World Cup, between September 13 and 21.
Bardi arrived in second (10s06), but had already reached the time to qualify for the World Cup twice, in the Paulista Championship (10s) and in the South American (9s99), taking the gold in both competitions.
To advance to the final in the Japanese capital, the pair will have to improve their times in a few thousandths of seconds. Today, Cardoso’s best time is the 16th mark of the year in the world; Bardi has the 30th.
The best time of the year is from Jamaican Kishane Thompson, who made 9s75, in June, in the National Championship of the Caribbean country. The best brand in history remains Usain Bolt, with 9s58 at the Berlin World Cup in 2009.
The first and last time Brazil had a representative among the eight finalists in the 100 m world among men was with Robson Caetano in 1991. The Brazilian ended in seventh, with 10s12, in a test won by Carl Lewis (9s86).
Among women, Rosângela Santos arrived in 2017, also obtaining the seventh place (11s06) in the final won by Tori Bowie (10s85).
“We want to make our race, the same we can do here. If we can fit it within the World Cup, we are very likely to reach a semifinal and suddenly to a final,” said Bardi.
“We know that it is very difficult to repeat the brand within a championship like this. There are 48 athletes from all over the world. The dispute has the Jamaicans, the Americans, the Canadians, the British … It’s always very hard proof.”
Cardoso acknowledged that it is more difficult to do the best time running abroad.
“In Brazil, we are more used to the atmosphere of the competition, whether with the fans, or with the opponents, against whom we competed every month. When we run outside, it’s different.”
Americans and Europeans are more often in Diamond League, while Brazilians have more experience against South Americans, facing the best only in major competitions, such as the World Cup and the Olympics.
With the experience of having played Paris games, Brazil’s fastest corridor said he hoped the acquired international baggage contributes to the performance on the track. “If we made a mistake before, the goal is to get now more experienced and try to get it right.”
“Mentally, we are doing a very strong job for them to understand that, regardless of the level of competition they are, World, Olympics, Brazil Trophy, which focus on their ray,” said Darci Ferreira da Silva, coach of the Sesi-SP Athletics team.
