Daniel Dias will compete at his second Paralympic Games in London in 2012 with high expectations. The 23-year-old Brazilian swimmer won a total of nine medals, four of which were gold, in Beijing in 2008, which helped him to win the 2009 Laureus Disability Award. His last big event on the road to London this year was the 2011 Parapan American Games in Guadalajara, Mexico, where he was the leading star of the Games, swimming to first place in all of his events to come away with 11 gold medals, setting Games records in seven of his races.
Daniel was born with malformed upper and lower limbs and took up swimming at the age of 16 after watching fellow Brazilian Clodoaldo Silva at the 2004 Athens Paralympic Games. He learned all four strokes in just two months.
