Watch Rubén Roldán, the young Costa del Sol amputee who holds a Guinness World Record for his amazing 'parkour' skills

Eugenio Cabezas

Malaga

Monday, 23 December 2024, 15:27

"Nobody should tell you where your limits are, you set them, because nobody knows your body better than you do." This is a phrase said by Rubén Roldán, a young resident of Rincón de la Victoria on the eastern Costa del Sol, who at the age of 21 has become a shining example of self-improvement and personal effort.

After suffering an accident involving a tractor on a family farm in April 2011, he had to have his left leg amputated. This disability prevented him from practising his favourite sport, parkour, an athletic training discipline from France, which involves dangerous jumps and pirouettes in the streets, using only street obstacles as a support. Before losing one of his two legs after he became trapped by his grandfather's tractor, Roldán played football, something he continued to do with his prosthesis, "although I play more as a goalkeeper", he told SUR in a report in April 2015.

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But Roldán continues to break barriers and his boundless effort and tenacity has now been rewarded with his inclusion in the 70th edition of the Guinness World Records book, which for its new 2025 edition features 2,638 new achievements, of which 15 are Spanish. Among them, is Rubén Roldán from Malaga. The young man from Ríncon de la Victroia has already appeared on Telecinco's 'Got Talent' programme in February 2016.

Then, he faced a challenge on the Italian television programme 'Tú sí que vales' (You are worth it) recorded in Milan last month. He had to do as many consecutive turns as possible on two opposite walls. This means performing jumps between two opposite walls with 180-degree turns. Ruben managed to perform 13 return jumps in the leg amputee category, which earned him the Guinness World Record, a moment that "filled him with pride and happiness".

"It's not that I'm a special person or have a superpower, I just started in the sport, I adapted according to my possibilities and abilities and little by little I've progressed to a level of jumping for people with two legs," he said after his triumph on Italian television. "This time we had more days to prepare the show and, from my point of view, taking into account that parkour is very difficult to transfer to a set, we prepared a very beautiful performance. It has been the one I have liked the most so far, much more powerful than all the previous ones, in which I have felt more comfortable and the one that has come closest to showing what we really do in the street," he pointed out on social media.

"All this would not have been possible without the help of the great @edu.nl, who has been our coordinator and partner in this incredible adventure. Thanks for your involvement in the project, for the motivation and for that great 'set up' that you did for the final, my colleague," Roldán said.

"In the end, we didn't manage to win but we are very happy with all our work. We lived it and most importantly, we enjoyed it like children. So I can say that, even though we are not winners, we feel like winners for having given our best," he added.

Rincon town hall joined in the congratulations with a message on its social media: "2024 leaves us a milestone for #RincónDeLaVictoria in the Guinness World Records! Rubén Roldán from Rincón de la Victoria has performed the highest number of backflips in a row (13) in a category for leg amputees".