“Heyyy, you’re so high, you! loose, incredulous, a big guy dressed in a fluorescent site uniform, raising his eyes to the teenager who exceeds him by three good heads. In the wide arteries lined with skyscrapers in downtown Montreal, Olivier Rioux, the giant with youthful features does not go unnoticed. Almost everyone turns in its path. “Wow, he’s huge,” whispered a man looking like a golden boy into his colleague’s ear, crossing the colossus in a tracksuit, forced to bend over to cross the doors of the Montreal Trust.
No sooner has he entered this mall than the green-eyed teenager is approached by a group of English-speaking hockey players. The dialogue begins. In the preamble, always the same question: “How tall are you? “7 feet 6 inches”, answers, with a slight smile, the young man, who kindly lends himself to a photo shoot. The umpteenth of the day.
At 17, Olivier Rioux is officially the tallest teenager in the world, according to Guinness World Records – the Turkish Sultan Kösen, his counterpart in the “adult” category, is 22 centimeters taller than him. In December 2020, the date on which its size was validated by the jury of the Guinness, the Quebecer was already 7 feet and 5 inches tall, or 2.26 meters. “Since then, I have taken 3 centimeters”, specifies Olivier Rioux, serene. He who dreamed, since the age of 10, of one day appearing in the bible of records, ensures that he lives well with this physical particularity. “By force, you get used to people’s comments… and door frames,” jokes the young man, who daily comes up against the limits of a world that is undersized to him.
Demonstration in a sporting goods store. “You have them in size 20 (equivalent to a 55 in Europe) ? he asks mischievously, pointing to Air Jordan sneakers on display. “Sorry, we’re only going until the 13th,” replies one of the sellers, sheepishly. Olivier is not surprised. To dress, he is often obliged to obtain supplies from specialized shops, or to order made-to-measure. “When he was younger, I added big rubber bands to the end of the sleeves or jogging, it allowed to gain a few centimeters”, testifies his mother, Anne, 1.83 meters.
At 8 years old, he already exceeds his mother
At the Rioux, Olivier is not the only one to sleep diagonally in a queen size bed so as not to have his feet sticking out. Émile, his older brother, is 2.05 meters tall, and his father, Jean-François, 2.03 meters. “It’s genetic. Our respective parents were themselves very tall for people of their generation,” confides Anne Rioux. When she gave birth to Olivier, however, she was far from imagining that he would grow so much.
On February 2, 2006, when the youngest was born at the Maisonneuve-Rosemont hospital in Montreal, his measurements (3.6 kilos for 53.3 centimeters) were nothing exceptional. But, a month later, the infant already weighs 7.2 kilos. “The home nurse was very surprised when she put him on the scale, remembers Olivier’s mother. He wasn’t particularly chubby or chubby, but his size 3 month onesies didn’t last long,” she explains.
At 1 year old, Olivier is wearing a 2 year old. “We always had to buy him clothes corresponding to twice his age”, continues the 50-year-old mother, portfolio manager in finance. In kindergarten, her son stands out in class photos. He is the only child in the back row not to be perched on a bench. In primary school, the boy is the same height as his teachers. At 8, he already exceeded his mother and, in judo, he faced his instructor, the only opponent of his size.
His extraordinary growth has never caused him any health problems, assure his parents. Olivier has even learned to take advantage of it. Since the age of 5, the Montrealer has been squealing his shoes on the parquet floors. Hope of Canadian Basketball, he dominates his opponents, literally and figuratively, and dreams of becoming an NBA star, like the Frenchman Rudy Gobert (2.16 meters) or the Greek Giannis Antetokounmpo (2.11 meters), his two idols. “Small models”, compared to the tricolor prodigy Victor Wembanyama (2.21 meters), future rookie of the American League – he will most likely be selected by the San Antonio Spurs on June 22 – whom the Quebecer would like to meet.
To reach the top, he trains relentlessly
If Olivier is 28 centimeters taller than the average height of an NBA basketball player, he knows that the most slender players, often slower than the others, are not necessarily the greatest champions. To reach the top, the one who evolves at the pivot position trains tirelessly, at the rate of three hours a day.
In his room, next to the frame that protects the certificate issued by Guinness, Olivier hung up the bronze medal won with the Canadian under-16 team in Mexico, during the Fiba U16 Americas Championship 2021. His first award in a tournament of this magnitude. But probably not the last, according to several observers.
In 2021, he obtained a scholarship to leave the family home in Terrebonne, a thirty-minute drive from the center of Montreal, and settle in Florida, on the ultra-chic campus of the IMG Academy. A luxurious American boarding school specializing in sports-studies, which counts among its former students the golfer Tiger Woods or the tennis player Serena Williams.
His impressive size served him above all as a springboard
When the American school year ends, he changes jerseys to start the summer season in Canada with his Montreal club, as well as within the national team, which selects him regularly since he was 15 years old. Romantic relationships? Very little for him. “I’ve never had a girlfriend before,” he confides, sitting next to his mother. My height is not the problem. For now, I prefer to focus on the game and on my studies. »
If he sometimes earns him ridicule, his impressive size has above all, so far, served as a springboard. “It allowed me to stand out. When I was 11, my coach at the time posted a photo on social media. A French recruiter saw her and invited me to come and play in Spain with his team, the Frenchy Phenoms. That’s where it all started, ”explains the teenager.
One day in June 2018, a Spanish website publishes a compilation of his actions. On the video that has gone viral, Olivier chains the baskets with astounding ease. From the top of his 2.13 meters, he rides his opponents, 12-year-old kids who come to his chest, at best. The basket being placed 2.60 meters high for the youngest, Olivier only has to raise his arms to reach it.
Internet users around the world are amazed by this amazing number 22 in a blue-white-red jersey, capable of “dunking” (putting the ball into the basket with his hands above the circle) without jumping. He will then be invited to participate in a tournament with the young players of Real Madrid.
Olivier hopes to play for the Toronto Raptors, the only Canadian team in the NBA
Since then, the boy has been more and more talked about. He is now regularly interviewed by the Canadian and American press, and already has more than 73,000 subscribers on Instagram. “Among them, there are as many basketball fans as people intrigued by his extraordinary physique,” explains Jean-François Rioux, who manages social networks for his son in order to protect him from possible derogatory comments. “I was made fun of when I was young. I suffered from it, that’s one of the reasons why I did everything to make him proud to be big, ”says the solid 48-year-old father. Mission accomplished.
Visibly well in his sneakers, Olivier patiently pursues his XXL dreams. One day, he hopes, he will don the red jersey of the Toronto Raptors, the only Canadian team to play in the NBA. He would then join the top 10 of the greatest players in the history of the American league, tied with the Chinese Yao Ming or the Senegalese Tacko Fall. Unless, of course, it eventually outgrows them, its growth may not be complete.
