Over the weekend the National Final of the Italian U23 Club Championship was held on the track and facilities of the “Putti” sports complex in Bergamo.
The two walking events took place on Saturday evening over the 5,000m track walk distance.
Of the twelve clubs (male and female) that had qualified for the final in the men's category, only five presented athletes at the start, while in the women's category there were ten starters.
5.000m track walk men
Undisputed and unequivocal victory for Emiliano Brigante (ITA) who, after remaining in the lead with about forty meters of advantage for the whole race in front of Giulio Scoli (ITA), had to suffer to win.
At the entrance of the last straight of the race Brigante is still about 35 meters ahead of Scoli and he thought he had already won by taking it easy enough, but not realizing that Scoli had started an incredible comeback, similar to the one that the older ones among our readers will remember made by Francisco Fernandez (ESP) against Hatem Ghoula (TUN) in Osaka 2007 of which we all know how it ended up.
This time, however, Brigante involuntarily helped also by the speaker who announced to the public Scoli's comeback attempt, in the last five meters he realizes that Scoli is side by side, but manages to change his pace just enough to keep the first place in 20:41.40.
Second place to Giulio Scoli (ITA) in 20:41.46
Third place to Daniele Breda in 22:31.73
5.000m track walk women
The U20 star of the Bergamo race walk, Casiraghi Martina, had no difficulty in winning the race after being in the lead from start to finish.
Her mark was 22:43.62 which represents the new personal best (previous of 23:32.43 obtained in Mantua, ITA on 23.8.2020), but which above all is the third U20 world performance in the 2021 season behind Sofia Ramos Rodriguez (MEX) who has in Mexico City on 1.5.2021 stopped the clock in 22:27.00 and Valeriya Sholomitska (UKR) who in Lvov (UKR) on 23.5.2021 obtained an excellent 22:27.81.
Second place to Diletta Casciotti (ITA) in 24:15.92
Third place to Alexandrina Mihai (ITA) in 24:16.69