Diamond League, Blue Wave

Athletics, program

The growth of Italian athletics, certified by recent successes and sealed by the triumph at the European team championships, is also evidenced by the ever-increasing number of athletes competing in Diamond League meetings. There will be as many as nine on Friday night in Lausanne in the sixth leg of the world’s top circuit (Yeman Crippa has renounced), and three more on Sunday in Stockholm (and what spikes: Tamberi, Iapichino, Sibilio). The double event will be visible on TV: Lausanne on Friday from 8 to 10 p.m. on RaiSport, Sky Sport Summer and Sky Sport Arena, Stockholm on Sunday from 6 to 8 p.m. on Rai 2 and Sky Sport Arena.

There is an Italian in almost every specialty. Let’s start with those who raised the cup in Chorzow for the first historic victory in the main continental event: Zane Weir (Fiamme Gialle), over all. The European indoor champion, one of seven individual winners in Chorzow (21.59), is essentially called to an Olympic final in the weight with world record holder Ryan Crouser, the other U.S. Joe Kovacs, New Zealand’s Tom Walsh and all the best of Europe including the other Italian Leonardo Fabbri (Aeronautica, 21.81 in Pergine, European seasonal leader), Croatian Filip Mihaljevic, Czech Tomas Stanek. In Silesia, talented long runner Mattia Furlani (Fiamme Oro) and hurdler Ayomide Folorunso (Fiamme Oro) finished second and seek confirmation: Furlani finds the same opponents as in Chorzow, namely the only one who beat him, Olympic champion Miltiadis Tentoglou of Greece, and the two other listed Europeans left behind him, Switzerland’s Simon Ehammer and Sweden’s Thobias Montler; Folorunso is in the 400hs with Holland’s queen Femke Bol. From the Slaski Stadium feat also comes Pietro Arese (Fiamme Gialle), who makes his Diamond League debut in a space 1500 with Olympic gold medalist Jakob Ingebrigtsen (Norway) and newly crowned world record holder in the steeplechase Lamecha Girma (Ethiopia). Instead after 4.25 in Poland she wants to turn the page in La Pontaise Roberta Bruni (Carabinieri), in her fourth Diamond League outing of the season, where Olympic and world gold medalist Katie Moon (USA) never misses. Spectacular at the Tricolori U23 the dance between the hurdles of Lorenzo Simonelli (13.40 regular, 13.29 windy): for his ‘first’ in Diamond League in the Athletissima meeting the 21-year-old from the Esercito finds the Japanese Shunsuke Izumiya and the Swiss Jason Joseph. First 800 of the outdoor season for Elena Bellò (Fiamme Azzurre) after her 2:36.35 in Nice in the 1000: the star is Britain’s Keely Hodgkinson, season’s dominator in 1:55.77. And there is a 400-meter lane in the pre-meet for Italian record holder Davide Re (Fiamme Gialle), strong from a convincing comeback in 45.54: he challenges training partner Ricky Petrucciani (Switzerland) and Dutchman Liemarvin Bonevacia.

Seven days after Chorzow’s 2.29, Olympic champion Gianmarco Tamberi (Fiamme Oro) is back on the platform: in Stockholm, stage No. 7, he finds an even higher technical level, given the presence of Korean world indoor gold medalist Woo Sang-hyeok, outdoor rainbow silver medalist, New Zealand’s Hamish Kerr with whom Gimbo shared the indoor bronze in Belgrade 2022, Australia’s Brandon Starc, and Ukraine’s Andriy Protsenko. After the victory in Florence, the first seal in the Diamond League, for Larissa Iapichino (Fiamme Gialle) it’s World Championships air again in the long: big match with Olympic and world gold medalist Malaika Mihambo (Germany), Serbia’s Ivana Vuleta, Nigeria’s Ese Brume, and Britain’s Jazmin Sawyers, the only one able to surpass her at the European indoor championships in Istanbul. Alessandro Sibilio (Fiamme Gialle) has never raced in the Diamond League: the debut is not exactly ‘soft’, in the presence of world record holder Karsten Warholm (Norway) and other excellent 400hs performers such as France’s Wilfried Happio, Estonia’s Rasmus Magi, Turkey’s Yasmani Copello. With Chorzow’s 48.14, although achieved without technical perfection, one can think big.