SARNO – What led Angelo Crescenzo, karateka from Sarno born in 1993 and raised in the Shirai Club of San Valentino Torio, to the Olympic Games scheduled in Tokyo this summer was a long, winding and sometimes uphill road. A challenge in the challenge, the competitive one against the other athletes, the one of the entire sports world against the pandemic and, finally, the personal one against Covid-19. A road on which Crescenzo walked for two and a half years before taking off the Olympic pass. «I dedicate this goal to myself, I think it is right. Then, to my family because we elite athletes are always inclined not to show real difficulties, only my family members know behind the scenes. Finally, thanks go to the Army and all the technical staff of the Italian national team and to Fijlkam, to the technical director Pierluigi Aschieri and to the team Manager Mauro Venanzetti who was close to me in difficult moments », comments the twenty-seven year old karateka on the Olympic qualification.
How was the path that will lead you to Tokyo this summer?
It has been a very long and complicated journey. I started in September 2018 with the first qualifying race in Berlin, getting a gold, after a few months in Madrid I won the Karate World Championships, thus placing me immediately at the top of the ranking. The stages leading up to the Olympics have been 19 up to now and, despite the initial statistics, I have managed to take home 10 medals out of 19 events.
Every long-felt and long-lasting path has some obstacles …
Yes, in January 2020 I had a first moment of darkness when, on the occasion of the Premiere League in Paris, I was out of the qualifying zone. But thanks to my staff, the Army and the Shirai Club of San Valentino Torio, we passed that moment and, in fact, in the next two races I reached the final.
But then the pandemic stopped everything. What happened from then on?
The world has stopped and at the beginning even the WKF didn’t know how to move. When it was understood that it was no longer possible to organize and plan other qualifying stages, the decision was made to close the ranking. I was inside, I was happy to be able to leave for Tokyo. The situation then changed once again quickly because, when the postponement of the Olympics to 2021 was made official about a year ago, it was decided to reopen the ranking: this meant that we were all back in the game. I tasted the Olympic Games and then I saw the pass slip out of my hands.
Olga Sammauro
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