FROM THE ENCOUNTER IN TOKYO. Filippo Ganna blows up the Izu velodrome. With a sensational comeback, even more incredible than the one shown yesterday in the semifinal, the locomotive from Verbania dragged the three blue wagons composed of Francesco Lamon, Simone Consonni and Jonathan Milan to the gold medal in the team pursuit of track cycling, defeating the big favorite Denmark by 166 thousandths after having accumulated a delay of almost a second with four laps to go.
Italy returns to win this test at the Olympic Games sixty-one years after the success of Rome in 1960 and does so by further retouching the world record already set yesterday in the semifinals, bringing it to 3’42 “032 (against 3’42” 198 made by the Danes). When he crossed the finish line, Top Ganna put his hands to his ears to gather the applause of the audience, as here in Shizuoka prefecture is allowed access to local spectators.
The Azzurri coach Marco Villa, also incredulous for the legendary feat of his boys, moved: «I thought it was still a dream, but it came true. I had to show the kids that I believed it, but I didn’t know what to expect. What we have done in these two days has made our opponents go limp. When Pippo went ahead I believed in it and, in fact, then we won ».
The Italian ace Filippo Ganna strongly believed in it: «We knew we were competitive, so it was last night that we wanted to arrive and do something big. We knew we had a good parachute, but we didn’t want the parachute, because we wanted to free dive towards the big result. We managed to get it with a lot of effort, sweat and teamwork ».
Even when the Danes seemed to have fled away, he went to retrieve them, taking Consonni and Milan with him, while Lamon had finished his work. «We knew they were stronger over that distance, but also that in the last kilometer we had a good sprint to make up for all the lost ground – continues the Verbanese champion -. I thought about pedaling and doing the best possible performance and not about the table and the world record has arrived. The guys put me in the best possible condition. Once I am launched and I have taken the rhythm I just have to keep it, nothing else. I assure you that doing the work of the other three is much more difficult ».