Thrilling the crowds: The biggest freaks in Rio

THE motto “faster, higher, stronger” doesn’t do justice to these Olympic athletes, whose incredible skils have to be seen to be believed.

Adrian Carambula of Italy has been thrilling crowds at Copacabana beach with his unique serving style.

WE TUNE into the Olympics to stare in wonder at the speed of the sprinters, leaping ability of the jumpers and strength of the weightlifters — but there’s a whole separate category of athlete not properly represented by the motto “faster, higher, stronger”.

Rio has brought together more than 10,000 of the world’s finest competitors but among them there are a handful with the ability to perform feats no one else in their sport can match.

Today we celebrate those with skills to pay the bills — the athletes at the 2016 Games blowing people’s minds with their unique ability.

‘MR SKYBALL’

Italian beach volleyballer Adrian Carambula is certainly taking his sport to new heights. Known as “Mr Skyball”, the 28-year-old has been thrilling crowds at Copacabana beach with his unique serving style.

As you can see in the video above, Carambula employs a towering underhand service motion which enables him to impart serious spin on the ball before he sends it in to orbit.

It dips and swerves from heights of more than 30m, making it a huge challenge to deal with when he strikes it perfectly. “There are very few that are comfortable with it,” says Carambula, who is the only player in the world who uses the style. “Even if they say they’re comfortable, I know they’re not.”

Born in Uruguay, Carambula grew up playing football, including time at Urreta FC at the same time as current Barcelona superstar Luiz Suarez. But he moved with his family to Florida in his teens and took to the sand.

“I always played a creative style,” Carambula says. “Especially when I first started playing, I had a lot of time on my hands. And Miami being windy pretty much like every other day, I just started hitting the thing up there, and I saw what it was doing. And from then I was like, ‘Oh I think I can put this into my arsenal’.”

An Italian grandparent made him eligible to represent the European nation and after being named the World Tour’s rookie of the year in 2015, he has climbed to third in the world with partner Alex Ranghieri.

In Rio, Carambula has even been given his own soundtrack. The PA system controller at the venue plays the theme song from the James Bond film Skyfall every time one of his serves sails skyward.

KOREA’S GOLDEN BEAR

South Korea's Kim Woo-jin releases the arrow during the men's team archery competition in Rio.

Korea is the equivalent of the American men’s basketball team in archery. Introduced to the sport in primary school, standouts are put on punishing training regimes before being rewarded with professional contracts.

It’s resulted in 20 gold medals from the 37 titles contested since 1972, including four of the past five in the men’s team event. But there was huge pressure on this year’s outfit to restore the dynasty after the devastation — that’s right devastation — of a bronze medal finish in 2012.

Kim Woo-jin was the reigning world champion entering London but as a 20-year-old was shockingly left out of Korea’s three-man team. It was a decision which proved costly as Italy claimed the only gold of four available not to go to Korea.

He became the first man in history to win the world championships twice last year and selectors didn’t make the same mistake. Determined to take his chance in Rio, the man known as “Bear” shot the lights out.

He set a new world record for 72 arrows in the qualifying round — hitting the 10-point maximum 52 times. Half of those shots hit the inner ‘x’ ring — which is tallied to use as a tie-breaker if two archers score the same total. The ‘x’ ring is smaller in diameter than a tennis ball. From 70m away. Eat your heart out, Legolas.

Unlike the man whose record he broke — compatriot Im Dong-Hyun, who scored 699 in London — Kim took care of business the following day alongside Ku Bon-chan and Lee Seung-yun and knocked off the United States in the final. Australia finished third.

“I’ve been waiting for this moment, to get gold, for four years,” said Kim, who took up the sport as an eight-year-old after being told he had no future in athletics. “We trusted each other, and it happened. It just happened.”

KYRIE-DICULOUS

He got the handle 🏀🏀🏀💯 @kyrieirving https://t.co/otCT5NfCso

— KdTrey  (@KdTrey_23) August 2, 2016

NBA fans have spent the first five seasons of Kyrie Irving’s career trying to settle on a nickname which properly represents his ridiculous dribbling ability. “Cold Cuts”, “Killer Kyrie” and “Sir Handle-a- lot” have all failed to stick, so Irving continues to go by the “Uncle Drew” moniker created in his Pepsi commercials, or simply Kyrie.

Nickname or not, the 24-year-old point guard is poised to become one of the faces of Team USA’s stroll to another men’s basketball gold medal and a lot of it has to do with his otherworldly ball-handling skills.

The US will regularly put up 50-point margins on its opposition because of the almost unfair advantage in athleticism its players enjoy. The likes of Kevin Durant, DeMar DeRozan and DeAndre Jordan are simply taller, faster and more agile then the players they line up against, but Irving is worth celebrating because dribbling has far less to do with physical gifts then it does hard-work and dedication.

Irving will still have a physical edge over almost everyone he plays against, but he’ll also have the comfort of knowing he’s spent more time working on his handle than anyone too.

“Everybody always asks, ‘What did you do as a kid to get your handle like this?’” Irving told Bleacher Report. “And I tell them, ‘I just practised simple moves first -like crossovers, between the legs, behind the back - and then I would work on combinations in isolation situations by myself. Then I would have counters to every move, always being prepared for that - not only that second move, but that third, fourth, fifth move just in case.

“You always want to have those just-in-case moves in your repertoire. You want to keep the defence guessing. I don’t want guys to know this is the move I’m going to do right now just because they watched it on film. If he knows what move I’m going to do, I’m going to have about two, three counters to it. That’s kind of how I practised it.”

Good luck stopping that.

China's forward Zou Yuchen (L) defends against USA's guard Kyrie Irving during a Men's round Group A basketball match between China and USA at the Carioca Arena 1 in Rio de Janeiro on August 6, 2016 during the Rio 2016 Olympic Games. / AFP PHOTO / Mark RALSTON

Originally published as Thrilling the crowds: The biggest freaks in Rio