And it’s immediately a blue party, and what a party. The first gold medal of the European athletics championships speaks Italian, or rather, Apulian with our Antonella Palmisano who does not win, dominates, wins the women’s 20km race walk by a landslide, and does it in her own way, imposing her own pace right from the start. immediately without ever leaving the lead of the race. It couldn’t have started better than this for Italy who scored a double and found Palmisano as the absolute master and our lady of the march. Mottola’s team from Taranto wins in a time of 1h28’09” on the course set up in the Foro Italico park, around the Stadio dei Marmi with the arrival on the track of the Stadio Olimpico. The 32-year-old Fiamme Gialle walker makes the decisive breakthrough at the 12th kilometer and enriches her palmares with another gold after the Olympic gold in 2021, the two world bronzes (2017 and 2023) and the European bronze in 2018. In the history of the European Championships it is the third gold for the Italian women’s race walk after the two victories. Piedmontese Valentina Trapletti finishes on the 2nd step of the podium, second in 1h28″37″.
«I lived the race with a smile, I enjoyed it. I saw little attention for the march and now I’m happy. I didn’t go through an easy period, too many physical problems and the change of technical guidance. This victory shows that the right choices were made. I dedicate the success to Massimo Stano. It’s hard to stay at home but he will have great motivation for the Games.”
TODAY it’s LUCK’s turn And today it will be the turn of Francesco Fortunato, financier of the Fiamme Gialle, at the start in the same men’s race. The men will also march on the route that will start from Viale del Foro Italico to complete 19 laps of one kilometer around the Stadio dei Marmi and Piazza della Fontana della Sfera to conclude their efforts in the Stadio Olimpico in the final 400 metres. The Andria native will be the spearhead of the trio of Italian walkers: «It will be a very difficult race – he declared on the eve of the race – I am honored to be the Italian number one and I hope that everyone’s expectations coincide with my ambitions. It is clear that the climatic factor will be decisive and will have its weight, we know that it will be very hot but I hope that the public will be the eleventh man on the pitch.”
The Swede Perseus Karlstrom will be the man to beat according to Fortunato: «This year he has won everything and will be the most dangerous rival but he won’t be the only one, the Germans and Spaniards are formidable opponents, I hope to manage to get a medal».
Meanwhile, comforting news arrives from Rome on the recovery of the 20km Olympic champion and 35km world champion. «I have always been optimistic», reveals the Italian at the end of the test session to which he underwent at the Institute of CONI sports medicine and science. «We are checking to what point Massimo has reached in his recovery from a physiological point of view», explained the Italian technical director, Antonio La Torre – from a clinical-orthopedic point of view the situation has improved but we needed this test in incremental steps at 90% of body weight load. We will need other tests in the next 55 days to obtain very precise data but we can say we are at the starting line of the Olympic race.” The champion from Palo del Colle hopes to recover quickly and be ready in Paris: «I have always been optimistic and immediately prepared myself for recovery. I feel good but clearly I’m behind with my preparation and for this reason I won’t be at the start in Rome but in any case I’m recovering. For two weeks I’ve been working from 8am to 7pm and I have excellent sensations.”
