Hector Denayer, a warrior who swears by victory: “You must be Ragnar!”
Judo, football, BMX, Hector Denayer practiced a lot of sport before finding the discipline that suited his ambitions.
At the age of 14, he turned to swimming and immediately showed very strong potential.
Born without fingers on his left hand (agenesis), the swimmer never complained about his fate, even making fun of it, as the name of his Instagram account proves: @moiignon! A nickname given to him by his father and which allowed him to never ignore any possible mockery.
He has made enormous progress at the Alliance Dijon Natation with his coach. Ramzi Mekhmoukhwhich he joined with the aim of qualifying for the Paris 2024 Paralympic Games.
Hector Denayer is a specialist in the 100m breaststroke, a distance in which he won the bronze medal at the World Championships in Manchester (United Kingdom) in 2023 and then became vice-European champion in Funchal this year.
At 19, we don’t talk about age. While we thought he was rather programmed for the Los Angeles 2028 Paralympic Games, the Verdun native had the firm intention of succeeding at home.
“I’m going to the determined plot. I’m going for it with all my might. Excuse the terms, but my coach tells me ‘Our mistake!’ Tonight he told me, ‘You have to be Ragnar‘and I think I was a warrior and I knew how to fight,’ the double European vice-champion told Olympics.com.
