After the “forerunners” Marcell Jacobs and Gaia Sabbatini yesterday, a first large group of Azzurri from the national athletics team is leaving Fiumicino airport for Budapest, via Munich, to participate in the n edition . 19 of the World Cup in Budapest, the key event of the 2023 season, scheduled from Saturday 19 to Sunday 27 August.
Among these, the walkers Massimo Stano, Francesco Fortunato and Antonella Palmisano, the sprinter Zaynab Dosso, the triple jumper Emmanuel Ihemeje (triple), the four hundredth runners Davide Re and Lorenzo Benati, the hurdler Lorenzo Simonelli. Other athletes are leaving from various national airports, for a total of around thirty Azzurri today, such as the Olympic high jump champion Gianmarco Tamberi, the long jumper and winner of three stages of the Diamond League, Larissa Iapichino, the sprinter Samuele Ceccarelli, weightlifters Zane Weir and Leonardo Fabbri.
The technical director of the national teams, Antonio La Torre, fields 78 athletes, including 43 men and 35 women. Among the selected, there are the seven Olympic champions of Tokyo: Tamberi, Jacobs, Stano, Palmisano, the relay runners Filippo Tortu, Fausto Desalu and Lorenzo Patta.
Stano, world champion of the 35 km in the last edition of Eugene, is entered in both distances (20 km and 35 km). Among the Azzurri, then, the Olympic finalists Nadia Battocletti (5000m) and Alessandro Sibilio (400hs), the world bronze Eleonora Giorgi (walking), the world finalist Valentina Trapletti (20km walk), the medals of the European Championships in Munich Yeman Crippa ( 10,000), Sara Fantini (hammer), Osama Zoghlami (3,000 hedges), Matteo Giupponi (35 km).
From the Euroindoor in Istanbul also the silver of the triple Dariya Derkach and the silver relay runners Ayomide Folorunso, Alice Mangione, Eleonora Marchiando and Anna Polinari. First World Championships for the U18 European champion Mattia Furlani (long), eighteen years old, the youngest of the blue expedition, while it is the first experience in the absolute national team for Riccardo Meli (4×400) and Francesco Pernici (800).
Palmisano: ‘So much adrenaline and happy to compete’
The blue Olympic walking champions in Tokyo, Antonella Palmisano and Massimo Stano, who are leaving this morning from Fiumicino, via Munich, for the World Championships in Budapest, are not hiding and are not hiding their medal ambitions: “I’m certainly leaving with the same ambitions of two years ago and like every time I attack the bib: I don’t leave just to participate – says Palmisano – The difference is the extra adrenaline because I haven’t faced such an important competition for two years. skipping last season and the course was challenging enough to be here today; and so I’m happy to be on the starting line.”
For Stano “anxiety exists and is being felt in recent days. The very difficult challenge that I have set myself, together with my coach, is to try to bring home the most precious metals. And the the fact of having to defend an Olympic title over the 20 km and a world title over the 35 km, the more he has, the more he puts…”. “I’ve trained well, I’m fine – added the walker – and I believe in my means and in the tools that my coach has been able to give me. Let’s hope everything goes as planned. The spirit of the national team is high: the Olympics have given a little push for everyone, also as a spirit of emulation. I’ve seen so much harmony, there’s a continuous dialogue with the younger ones. He goes to help the movement and with a Captain like Tamberi you can’t help but be dragged along. I’m happy with all the results of the blue team and we hope this wave continues”
Jacobs: ‘I’m here and I’m in the running’
“I would have liked to have been the favorite for this World Cup, despite the weight of expectations it entailed.” Marcell Jacobs arrives at the World Championships in Budapest after a long break due to physical problems, but still with a smile: “I had a difficult season but I’m here”, the Olympic champion of the 100m told a meeting in Budapest organized by his technical sponsor “I’m sure it will be a really tough challenge, but I want to stay focused on myself, go day by day, and do my best when I go to the final.”
In the running for a medal are reigning champion Fred Kerley, Noah Lyles, Britain’s Zharnel Hughes, Kenya’s Ferdinand Omanyala and Botswana’s Letsile Tebogo. “I consider myself part of this game, even if the season didn’t go as I had planned: had it been like this, I would have run faster than them”. Jacobs will then be part of a group of sprinters starring in a Netflix series on the lives of athletes, in the wake of those already made for Formula 1 and the Tour de France: “It’s an incredible idea to be a member of this group: it allows the public to see behind the scenes and other aspects of an athlete’s life”.
Reproduction reserved © Copyright ANSA
2023-08-17 13:32:30
#Athletics #Azzurri #leaving #Budapest #World #Championships #Sports
