Phelipe Andrews Melo Rodrigues (born 10 August 1990) is a paralympicswimmer from Brazil competing mainly in category S10 events. He was born with a club foot and had two surgeries when he was just four weeks old. After his second surgery when his foot was in the right position he had an infection which made his leg blow the knee and specially his tendon to stop growing, disabling his right foot movements. He started swimming when he was 8 months as physiotherapy. He also tried many different sports but his passion since childhood was swimming.
First competitions
His first competitions was for "Academia Movimento" located in Olinda-PE, he competed for 4 years for his team, in 2007 he moved to João Pessoa - PB and joined the state team C.I.E.F. where he archived regional gold medals and twice 3rd place at nationals competitions with able bodied swimmers (non-disabled).
Paralympic sports
Phelipe was part of the Brazilian team that travelled to Beijing for the 2008 Summer Paralympics. There he competed in the 100-metre and 50-metre freestyle events where he won silver behind compatriot Andre Brasil. He also swam 400-metre freestyle where he failed to make the final, and competed as part of the Brazilian 4 × 100 m freestyle and 4 × 100 m medley teams but even with the gold and silver medal-winning S10 swimmers Brazil could not manage to win a medal finishing fourth and eighth respectively.
On his next Paralympic Game at London 2012 he archived another silver medal in the 100-metre freestyle, fourth place in the 50-metre freestyle event which gave him a medal in Beijing 2008 and fifth in the 100-metre butterfly.
He also participated in the Para-Panamerican Games in Guadalajara - Mexico in 2011 where he took 5 medals, 3 silver medals (50m,100m, 400m freestyle) and 2 gold medals (4 × 100 m freestyle and 4 × 100 m medley).
Following the 2012 Paralympics Rodrigues accepted an invitation to train in Manchester, where he stayed until the end of 2014 before returning to Brazil.[2]
At the 2016 Rio Paralympics Rodrigues won two silver and two bronze medals.[3]
