It was 7.41 pm when in the stadium in Brescia named to Gabre Gabric the athletes who would have given life to one of the most beautiful track waking events of the 2022 season in Italy lined up with the starter's gunshot.
Thirteen men lined up in lane 1 and eleven women lined up in lane 5.
There are two disqualification boards and two penalty areas with the same support staff.
10,000m track walk men
In the 10,000m track walk the joy of Andrea Cosi, trained by Marco Ugolini explodes: the 21 year old of the Atletica Firenze Marathon, this year already dropped to 1:21:59 on the 20km before the tenth place in the European Championships, immediately sets an unsustainable pace for opponents and breaks down his limit with 39:13.80, less than half a minute from the best Italian U23 performance, in front of of Francesco Fortunato (Enterprise Sport & Service, 39:55.00) and the other U23 Riccardo Orsoni (Cus Parma), to the personal best in 40:00.55.
But behind these arid numbers there is a “re-adjustment” (but it takes a good dose of courage to call it “re-adjustment”) to your personal best of 2:01.10. An incredible performance for an end-of-season competition in a Club Championship Final in which athletes usually participate only to please the managers of their clubs.
Yesterday, no, it didn't really happen like that and we saw it right from the gunshot.
Andrea Cosi jumps off and leads the race immediately, stunned by the fiercest pair of opponents: Francesco Fortunato and Riccardo Orsoni who look at each other and maybe think: "but where does that one want to go?"
And "that one" wants to go far, towards a victory that not even he expected perhaps before the race, but courageously wanted with this incredible series of splits.
- 1.000m: 3:39.5
- 2.000m: 7:58.5 (3:59.0)
- 3.000m: 11:53.0 (3:54.5)
- 4.000m: 15:49.1 (3:56.1)
- 5.000m: 19:41.8 (3:52.7) also broken down his personal best on the distance of 19:52.98 established in Florence (ITA) on 2.5.2021
Encouraged by this split Cosi indulges in a dream that lasts another 12 and a half laps of the Gabre Gabric track.
However, his is a triumphal walk. Never a technical flaw, alert and careful tp the advice of Alessandro Gandellini who shouts to him to keep his arms fluid and not to harden with the body, and off towards what until yesterday seemed an impossible dream.
- 6.000m 23:39.0 (3:57.2)
- 7.000m 27:32.9 (3:53.9)
- 8.000m 31:26.6 (3:53.7)
- 9.000m 35:16.4 (3:59.8)
- last 1.000m in 3:57.40 best seasonal performance of 2022 and 6th European performance.
But if we only consider U23 athletes and exclude those from Russia because they cannot yet participate in international competitions, this performance takes on an even more important value. It is the first in the world in this 2022 season.
Even behind him they are given a good trashing.
For just over halfway through the race Francesco Fortunato and Riccardo Orsoni fought one after the other until Fortunato (personal best of 39:00.79 in Florence on 15.6.2019) forces his pace and takes off by about twenty meters Orsoni (personal best of 40:51.02 in Bergamo on 10.9.2020).
On the last lap Orsoni reacts, but it is too late. He ends furious as for 56/100 of a second he doesn't break down the 40:00.00 wall
The others are far away.
10,000m track walk women
In the women's 5,000 walk, the young Alexandrina Mihai has no fear of imposing the pace on Valentina Trapletti who is only 18 years older.
Even the two women show off a textbook technical gesture.
After the 3.000m Valentina Trapletti forces the pace and imposes her superiority.
These are her splits.
- 1.000m 4:14.6
- 2.000m 8:31.7 (4:17.1)
- 3.000m 12:43.8 (4:12.1)
- 4.000m 17:21.4 (4:37.6)
- last 1.000m in 4:33.31
Second place to Alexandrina Mihai who consoles herself with a small "re-adjustment" to the personal best on the distance by stopping the clock at 22:30:46 compared to 22:54.81 obtained in Rieti on 2.7.2022
Third place went to Beatrice Bertolone U18 from Turin in 24:24.50
It is almost 20:30 pm when in the mixed zone we see the compliments to Marco Ugolini from the technical staff for the result of Andrea Cosi, but above all for him, the embrace (with consequent kiss) of his girlfriend.
The day ends here.
Official results
The results in the other locations
Silver - Perugia results
Bronze - Palermo results
B Final - Saronno results
