SENT TO TOKYO. The IOC accepted the Italian request to also award Bruno Rosetti the bronze medal of 4 without. The Italian rower is in isolation after having tested positive at Covid a couple of hours before the final which then saw his teammates close in third place.
“I am very happy to have received the news from President Malagò of this decision of the IOC – says Rosetti in a note released by Coni and Federcanottaggio -. Something that, in some way, repays me for an event that involved me in spite of myself and I still can’t understand how it could have happened ». Rosetti is in a Covid hotel where he is monitored by the Japanese health authorities. Only after the negativization will you be able to leave the facility and return to Italy.
“In these days I have read a lot and I want to say immediately that I have not closed myself in silence, but I have respected everyone’s work and I needed to metabolize the disappointment of not being able to compete with my boat mates”, underlines Rosetti in the press release. . The 33-year-old athlete from Ravenna, a past also as an offshore oil rig operator, rejoiced at the successes of his teammates whom he could only watch from afar: “I congratulate all the Italian rowing team who made a great Olympics and Marco Di Costanzo in particular who sat in my place and guaranteed Matteo Castaldo, Matteo Lodo and Giuseppe Vicino to crown the dream of the Olympic podium ».
Rosetti thus climbs on the podium together with the four without which, of course, he feels like his boat. The assignment of the bronze medal to Rosetti was made official by the Sport Director of the IOC, Kit McConnell, who accepted the request, considering it well founded, “due to the complexity of the moment lived and the contribution offered by the rower to achieve the final by the boat ».
“I am overjoyed for Rosetti, Bruno deserved this medal recognition, not only because he had built a path to play the very important final for him, but for the way in which this positivity was reached at Covid, the boy did not commit lightness and it is not clear how he could have been infected, and this created a lot of bitterness in him », comments with a heartfelt tone Giuseppe Abbagnale, monument of rowing and president of the Italian Federation. «It is an exceptional thing but the spirit must be rewarded – declared Abbagnale to the beraking latest news agency -. I hope it is not the only exception, in these Olympics we have seen everything and more. The consolation is that the Games took place, for the athletes the culmination of a 5 year job, but the difficulties were many, the athletes were commendable ».
Bruno Rosetti regrets not having taken part in the final. The rower tested positive for coronavirus within hours of the final, despite having received two doses of the vaccine. Now he has to wait until everything is over before he can leave. The news of the bronze awarded to him slightly lifts his spirits: «Now I continue in my quarantine and I hope to receive this medal before I return to Italy. Thanks to all those who have been close to me ».