Inspired by Olympic champion teammate, refugee athlete Hadi Tiranvalipour wants to write his own history at Paris 2024
Hadi Tiranvalipour spent his first 10 days as a refugee in Italy living in a forest. Now he is heading to the Olympic Games Paris 2024.
He spent his first few months living on sofas and washing dishes at a restaurant to make ends meet. So, when explaining how important taekwondo has been in his life, it's evident he means it.
“When I arrived here, I didn't know anybody,” Tiranvalipour tells Olympics.com, “and I told myself, ‘You only have one friend. Taekwondo is your friend.’ Taekwondo is not just a sport for me. Taekwondo is my life and it gave me everything.”
A national and continental champion who represented the land of his birth for eight years, the taekwondoin is now heading to Paris to represent the IOC Refugee Olympic Team.
He is fulfilling his Olympic dream - even if he did not anticipate it for 2024.
Tiranvalipour explains, “It’s a really great moment for me because after European qualification, I didn’t have any expectation to make the Olympic list. I had to make many sacrifices, training three times a day and losing weight. I would like to be in the Olympics as a fighter, not just as a participant. I fight until the last second.”
Hadi Tiranvalipour, shaped by Olympic champions past and present
It was 20 years ago that Tiranvalipour’s dream and love of taekwondo was born.
Perhaps poetically, the man who inspired him shares his name: the legendary Hadi Saei, who won three medals in the first three Olympic taekwondo competitions.
The Iranian taekwondoin won his first gold medal in the men’s featherweight event at Athens 2004 and is the nation’s most decorated athlete. Tiranvalipour vividly remembers watching Saei’s gold medal duel with Huang Chih-Hsiung of Chinese Taipei.
He recalls, “I told my mother I would like to be like him, and one day I would like to participate in the Olympics like him. After 20 years, my Olympic dream has come true and I’m really happy. I would really like to get a medal like him.”
In his pursuit of a medal of his own in Paris, Tiranvalipour trains alongside a man who knows a thing or two about a taekwondo triumph. Vito Dell'aquila is the defending Olympic champion in the men’s 58kg and is key to pushing him for greatness.
“He is one of the best taekwondo players in the world,” Tiranvalipour says of Dell’aquila. “We are in the same category and always fighting each other. Whenever I’m tired, I look to Vito as an example and it motivates me. If I want to put my name on the list of Olympic champions, I have to keep going without any make excuses.”
Tiranvalipour and Dell’aquila train together in the Italian taekwondo team, based at the Olympic Sports Centre in Rome, which the former is full of praise for.
“The Italian federation and taekwondo team is the best in Europe,” he explains, “this is a really good chance to grow and develop my technique, it is a really great opportunity.”
Tiranvalipour and his passion for education
Though Tiranvalipour is committed to his passion of taekwondo, he has always grown up with the values of a solid education.
When he arrived in Italy, he applied for a student visa so he could attend “one of the best universities in Italy”, the University of Tor Vergata in the Italian capital of Rome.
Alongside training for Paris 2024, he is studying for a master’s degree which he will conclude at the end of the Games.
“I would like to win a gold medal, but I know that one day, my sporting career will finish and I have to make future plans,” Tiranvalipour explains. “I would like to continue my education with a PhD degree, I would like to be a doctor or a university professor, and share all of my experience and knowledge to all students.”
“I want to be at the Olympics to represent 120 million people”
The IOC Refugee Olympic Team consists of 37 athletes living in 15 different countries, each with their own unique stories and playing a vital role in how refugees are represented on the global stage.
For Tiranvalipour, becoming an Olympian is one thing, but serving as a role model and example for refugees around the world carries just as much significance.
“A refugee athlete is nothing like a normal athlete,” he admits. “They have a really difficult life, and we are far away from our family. I want to be at the Olympics to represent 120 million people. I know life for refugees and displaced people are so difficult, so I want to be a good example.
“We don’t have a flag, but we have 120 million people behind us, so we have to represent all of them. If you have a dream, you have to keep going. This is our responsibility to tell them.”
The Refugee Olympic Team not only gives refugees the opportunity to compete at the highest sporting level despite their challenges faced, but allows refugees to be represented in new lights.
Just because they are displaced, it does not mean that they cannot be world-class athletes, as Tiranvalipour hopes to prove. His message to refugees is simple: “If you have a dream, if you have a target, if you have a purpose, you have to keep going.”