Frederico Ricciardi Pinheiro de Melo (born 13 July 1987 in Azusa, California,

United States The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 states, a federal district, five major unincorporated territori ...

) is a

Portuguese Portuguese may refer to: * anything of, from, or related to the country and nation of Portugal ** Portuguese cuisine, traditional foods ** Portuguese language, a Romance language *** Portuguese dialects, variants of the Portuguese language ** Portu ...

sailor, who specializes in heavyweight one-person dinghy ( Finn) and two-person keelboat ( Star) classes. He represented his nation

Portugal Portugal, officially the Portuguese Republic ( pt, República Portuguesa, links=yes ), is a country whose mainland is located on the Iberian Peninsula of Southwestern Europe, and whose territory also includes the Atlantic archipelagos of ...

, along with his partner and three-time Olympian

Afonso Domingos Afonso Manuel Costa Gaspar da Silva Domingos (born 29 July 1969 in Maputo, Mozambique) is a Portuguese sailor, who specialized in mixed multihull (Nacra 17) and two-person keelboat ( Star) classes. He represented his nation Portugal in three edi ...

, at the 2012 Summer Olympics, and has trained throughout his sailing career with Cascais Naval Club ( pt, Clube Naval de Cascais) in his current residence Cascais, under his personal coach Andy Zawieja. Born and raised in the United States, Melo also held a dual citizenship to compete internationally for his parents' homeland in sailing. As of June 2015, Melo was ranked twentieth in the world for the heavyweight one-person dinghy class by the International Sailing Federation. Melo qualified for the Portuguese sailing team in the Star class at the 2012 Summer Olympics in

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, securing a berth by placing thirteenth at the 2011 ISAF World Championships in

Perth, Western Australia Perth is the capital and largest city of the Australian state of Western Australia. It is the fourth most populous city in Australia and Oceania, with a population of 2.1 million (80% of the state) living in Greater Perth in 2020. Perth i ...

. He and his skipper Domingos struggled to mount a challenge against a field of fifteen other boats throughout the ten-race series, ending them in the penultimate position out of sixteen with a net grade of 108. In 2017-18 he was a crewmember on the boat Turn the Tide on Plastic in the Volvo Ocean Race.

References

External links

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NBC Olympics Profile
1987 births Living people Portuguese male sailors (sport) Olympic sailors for Portugal Sailors at the 2012 Summer Olympics – Star People from Azusa, California Sportspeople from Los Angeles County, California Sportspeople from California American people of Portuguese descent Volvo Ocean Race sailors {{Portugal-yachtracing-bio-stub