Rui Manuel Monteiro Silva (born 3 August 1977) is a Portuguese

track and field Track and field (or athletics in British English) is a sport that includes Competition#Sports, athletic contests based on running, jumping, and throwing skills. The name used in North America is derived from where the sport takes place, a ru ...

athlete and coach who represents

S.L. Benfica (), commonly known as Benfica, is a professional football club based in Lisbon, Portugal, that competes in the Primeira Liga, the top flight of Portuguese football. Founded on 28 February 1904, as ''Sport Lisboa'', Benfica is one of the " ...

. As a distance runner, he specializes at the

1500 Year 1500 ( MD) was a leap year starting on Wednesday in the Julian calendar. The year 1500 was not a leap year in the proleptic Gregorian calendar. The year 1500 was the last year of the 15th century and the first year of the 16th century. ...

and

3000 m The 3000 metres or 3000-metre run is a track running event, also commonly known as the "3K" or "3K run", where 7.5 laps are run around an outdoor 400 m track, or 15 laps around a 200 m indoor track. It is debated whether the 3000 m shou ...

events, although he has at times run the

800 metres The 800 metres, or 800 meters (American and British English spelling differences#-re.2C -er, US spelling), is a common track running event. It is the shortest commonly run middle-distance running event. The 800 metres is run over two laps of a ...

as well. Silva is the current national champion at 1500 m.

Biography

Silva was the Olympic

bronze medal A bronze medal in sports and other similar areas involving competition is a medal made of bronze awarded to the third-place finisher of contests or competitions such as the Olympic Games, Commonwealth Games, etc. The outright winner receives ...

ist at Athens in 2004, where he went from last place to third place in less than 400 meters, his last lap being in 51.3 seconds. His last 800 meters of that race were run in 1:46.3, believed to be the second-fastest final 800 metres of any 1500-meter race in history (behind

Abdi Bile Abdi Bile (, ; born 28 December 1962) is a former middle distance runner. He holds the highest number of national records in athletics in Somalia across various disciplines. He is currently Somalia's national record holder in nine athletic disc ...

's 1:46.0 at the 1987 World Championships). Injuries prevented him from participating in various international competitions from 2007 to 2009. In addition to his Olympic medal, he won the 1500 m bronze at the

2005 World Championships in Athletics The 10th World Championships in Athletics (, ), under the auspices of the International Association of Athletics Federations (IAAF), were held in the Olympic Stadium, Helsinki, Finland (6 August 2005 – 14 August 2005), the site of the first ...

. He has had much success indoors over 1500 m, having won the World Indoor title in 2001 and taken the European Indoor title on three occasions. Running in the European Cross Country, he came third running an even-paced race with a fast finish to claim the bronze position. The race was over 10 kilometres and was run at a very quick pace throughout. He began to move up in distance from 2009 onwards. He ran in the 5000 m and

10,000 metres The 10,000 metres or the 10,000-metre run is a common long-distance track running event. The event is part of the athletics programme at the Olympic Games and the World Athletics Championships, and is common at championship-level events. The ...

at the

2011 World Championships in Athletics The 13th IAAF World Championships in Athletics () was an international athletics competition that was held in Daegu, South Korea. It started on 27 August 2011 and finished on 4 September 2011. The United States topped the medal standings in the ...

, being eliminated in the heats in shorter distance, but coming eleventh over the 10,000 m. He competed at the

Lisbon Half Marathon EDP Lisbon Half Marathon is an annual international half marathon competition which is contested every March in Lisbon, Portugal. It carries IAAF Gold Label Road Race status. The men's course record of 57:31 was set by Jacob Kiplimo in 2021, which ...

in March 2012 and was the first Portuguese home in fourth place with a personal best of 1:02:40 hours. His daughter is middle-distance runner, Patricia Silva. Patricia won a bronze medal at the women's 800m event at the

World Athletics Indoor Championships The World Athletics Indoor Championships are a biennial indoor track and field competition served as the global championship for that version of the sport. Organised by the World Athletics, the competition was inaugurated as the ''World Indoor G ...

in 2025.

Competition record

References

External links

*
Yahoo Sports profile of Rui Silva

Association of the Portuguese Olympic Athletes (AAOP)
{{DEFAULTSORT:Silva, Rui 1977 births Living people People from Santarém, Portugal Portuguese male long-distance runners Portuguese male middle-distance runners Athletes (track and field) at the 2000 Summer Olympics Athletes (track and field) at the 2004 Summer Olympics Olympic athletes for Portugal Olympic bronze medalists for Portugal World Athletics Championships medalists European Athletics Championships medalists Medalists at the 2004 Summer Olympics Olympic bronze medalists in athletics (track and field) S.L. Benfica athletes World Athletics Indoor Championships winners Sportspeople from Santarém District