January 30, 18:23
Sport
Beijing 2022: Moioli, Brignone, Fontana the blue hopes
Difficult to get into the top 10 among the nations, so you need a minimum of five golds
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Beijing -5: Moioli-Brignone-Fontana, blue hopes / SPECIAL © ANSA / A
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Michela Moioli © ANSA / A
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The desire is great, the hopes even more, the goal is only one: to do better than in
PyeongChang 2018
, when Italy closed with ten medals, three of which gold. It is more difficult to get into the top 10 among the nations, for which you need at least five golds, and it is utopian to think of beating the record of twenty medals, which has resisted since
Lillehammer 1994
. However, the premises are there, because the team is large (118 athletes, 46 women) and complete and the protagonists of four years ago are almost all ready to try again, with women in the role of the drivers.
The golds of Korea were brought by
Michela Moioli
(snowboard cross),
Arianna Fontana
(500 meters short track) and
Sofia Goggia
(downhill).
If the first two have everything to prove themselves, the unfortunate fall of Cortina casts a shadow over the Lombard's hopes of a repeat.
But the national Sofia is doing everything to be ready for the five-ring appointment ("work very in progress" she wrote while training in the gym), and alpine skiing still has what it takes to aim for important medals and you can place more trust especially in fast disciplines.
Personal conditions aside, the real unknown, however, will be the Chinese tracks, unknown to everyone.
The blue medal table can also count on champions such as
Federica Brignone
and
Elena Curtoni
to grow . If Goggia dominated the downhill season and before the injury she aspired to confirm herself as Olympic champion. In super-G, Brignone is the leader: Garmisch's victory, the last stage before the Games, launches her among the absolute protagonists. Curtoni has also been on the podium twice. The Aosta Valley will also have the combined race available, and the giant, where even
Marta Bassino
can have her say . In the men's field, the only real top athlete is the sprinter
Dominik Paris
, who will compete in the free which, at 4 Italian hours on Sunday 6 February, will open the Olympic program for alpine skiing. The South Tyrolean also focuses on the super-G and, if the slalom does not have sensational slopes, he could have his say in combined. Then the only two concrete chances come from the giant and the special:
Luca De Aliprandini
, silver champion in Cortina, is among the best in the giant.
Same goes for
Giuliano Razzoli
and
Alex Vinatzer
between the tight posts.
On the snow, there are also hopes from cross-country and biathlon competitions.
The Aosta Valley
Federico Pellegrino
can aim for the podium in the sprint race (in Korea he was silver), while the mixed relay race with
Dorothea Wierer
can assert themselves between rackets and rifles , but she will have other tests available to have her say (pursuit, sprint and individual).
Also keep an eye on
Lukas Hofer
.
From classic to contemporary, Italy has found a forge of medals in snowboarding and in Beijing it counts on 40-year-old
Roland Fischnaller
, world champion of parallel giant, a specialty where he can also do well.
Mirko Felicetti
.
Obviously the spearhead is the flagship Moioli, snowboardcross specialist, who will be able to have her say paired with
Lorenzo Sommariva
in the mixed race that debuts in China.
Turning to the disciplines of ice, Arianna Fontana promises hot blades in the short track also in Beijing, being able to compete successfully in 'her' 500, but also in 1000 and 1500. The spoils of the blue and of Italy can then grow with the women's relay.
There are also more than legitimate hopes in speed skating, where
Francesca Lollobrigida and Andrea Giovannini
, both at the third Olympics, will try to finally get on the podium.
Between bobsleigh, luge and skeleton are the last two disciplines to offer some chances.
Still disappointed by the wooden medal remedied in Korea,
Dominik Fischnaller
can aim for the podium in the single but also in the Team-relay.
In the reverse position you go down with the skeleton, where Italy seems to have found a good interpreter in
Valentina Margaglio
, fresh from European bronze after the world champion won in 2020 in the team competition together with
Mattia Gaspari
.
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