Antoni Gaudi, the artist of the Sagrada Familla in Barcelona, said that «the straight line is the line of men, the curved one is the line of God». Stirling Moss, the champion of drivers, said that “the straights are just the boring stretches that connect the curves”. The man on the curve today is the golden relay runner Lorenzo Patta, a twenty-four year old from Oristano, athlete of the Fiamme Gialle.
«I like running in curves, it comes naturally to me. Maybe I’m pleased by the fact that I’m doing well. It’s not very easy: it takes a certain technique, you have to run a little bent over.”
As a teenager it wasn’t a curve but a band…
«Yes, I wanted to be a footballer, I ran on the wing and then maybe converged on the center».
A type like…?
«Are we exaggerating? El Shaaravy, but with much less good feet.”
A Romanist? In Oristano, the heart of Sardinia?
«But I’m a Romanist. Scarves and t-shirts. My father taught me this. I’ve only seen her live once, a Roma-Leicester match at the Olimpico, and I plan to go back as soon as I can.”
Favorite Roma player?
«Now he’s on the bench: Daniele De Rossi».
Meanwhile at the Olimpico he could return as a relay runner at the European Championships in June. What place? The one or the three, Mike Bongiorno would ask, with the emphasis on the “is”?
«Preference for three. It’s the village I’ve always dreamed of. There is the double change, double risk, then between Marcell Jacobs and Filippo Tortu, what a responsibility, like in Budapest for the world silver. In Tokyo I started from the blocks, only one change. Yes, as a Roma fan the Olimpico is my stadium: I raced there at the Golden Gala, certainly at the European Championships in June it will be something else.”
What do you think about on the track?
«Nothing, no time to think. Only one word is said or heard.”
Which?
«Hop».
It’s just a sound.
«Yes, at the change. You have to say it in sync with the passing of the baton. You also have to recognize the voices amidst all the chaos in the stadium.
But we train a lot on this during rallies. There are risks: if you are the receiver you have to start right at the sign and the sound, if you are the one who passes the stick you have to find your teammate’s hand at the signal.”
And how did you find running without a ball at your feet, discovering that if they weren’t so good for football they could be good for athletics?
«A classic: at the Student Games, 100 meters, second place without having specifically prepared them».
He was a student at the sports-oriented scientific high school (the “Mariano IV” in Arborea, near Oristano) with a few goals on his CV, 32 among the very young players of the “Santa Giusta Calcio”, 22 among the students according to the football records. And then?
«Then with Valentina Piras, and then Professor Francesco Garau saw me and took me to the track. He still trains me.”
Dove?
«In Oristano, alone. Then there are the relay rallies. I feel good in Oristano, with friends at rallies too. Now it’s already hot in my house. We train in the morning, then it’s time for lunch.”
Preferences at the table?
«What they make I eat. I’m a normal guy. Even physically. Maybe even too much.”
Social?
“The right”.
The almanacs say he is 1.73 meters tall and weighs 60 kilos, not a muscular sprinter (and someone who is muscled by force…) of today.
«I may seem fragile, but I have strong feet: they are good for rebounds».
And Sardinia in the heart…
«We Sardinians are like this, we are born with a passion for our land; there’s no reason, it’s just the way it is.”
In your heart for 2024?
“Something big.”
Even if it’s shiny, it doesn’t say so. Superstition goes quickly even in curves… Said Filippo Tortu, the man to whom Patta gave the “hop” in Budapest: «Which medal moved me the most in Tokyo apart from my own? That of Patta, that of Jacobs, that of Desalu.” Do you get the hint? Paris is worth a curve also for Lorenzo, the Roma player from Oristano…
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1970-01-01 00:00:00
#life #curve #Jacobs #Tortu
