By Pearl Josephine Nazare
MILAN, Feb 17 (Reuters) – An inspired Italy delighted the home crowd with a stunning victory in the Winter Olympics men’s team pursuit final, while Canada’s Ivanie Blondin, Valerie Maltais and Isabelle Weidemann delivered another seamless performance to beat the Netherlands in the women’s event and retain their title on Tuesday.
Italy’s men upset the United States, who arrived at the Milano Cortina Games as world champions and strong favourites for gold.
Spurred on by double Olympic champion Francesca Lollobrigida, the Italian team of Davide Ghiotto, Andrea Giovannini and Michele Malfatti electrified a frenzied arena as they stormed to a time of three minutes 39.20 seconds – a commanding 4.51 seconds clear of the Americans, with China taking bronze.
The roar inside the Milano Speed Skating Stadium as Italy powered home was thunderous as the crowd rose to their feet, cheering the host nation to one of their most special golds of a highly successful Games.
Italy now top the speed skating medal table at Milano Cortina with three golds and one bronze, and sit second overall with nine golds, four silvers and 11 bronze medals. Norway lead the overall standings with 13 golds.
The American trio of Ethan Cepuran, Casey Dawson and Emery Lehman – who call themselves the “Pain Train” – had hoped to deliver the United States’ first Olympic title in the event.
Dawson even skipped his individual 10,000 metres on Friday to give himself the best chance in the team pursuit, a gamble that ultimately did not yield gold.
The American world record holders opened with a controlled, slightly faster start. But, true to the form they have shown all Games, the hosts responded with composure and belief.
With four laps to go Italy looked to be fading, yet with three laps remaining they rallied, drawing strength from the roar of the home crowd. Their coach was a blur of fist pumps and shouts, urging them on as they clawed back time with every stride.
By the final lap, the arena was shaking. Italy had pulled it off again – a stirring performance that lifted the roof and sent the stands into delirium. Cameras cut to Lollobrigida beaming as the home nation celebrated another unforgettable gold.
“Today is fantastic, it’s incredible,” Ghiotto said. “It’s a dream come true after four years of working together every day.
“It wasn’t easy to beat the American guys today, and Netherlands in the first part (semi-final). They’re both very good and strong teams, but we dreamed about this gold medal.
“This day and this result was impossible without these guys and the other guys from the Italian team. We are very happy. It’s crazy we made the dream come true.”
Canada’s women crossed the line 0.96 seconds ahead of the Netherlands, stopping the clock at two minutes 55.81 seconds, and Japan rounded out the women’s podium by beating the U.S. in the Final B.
Weidemann, a three-times medallist at Beijing and the tallest of the Canadian trio, once again excelled in her role setting the pace, guiding the team with a smooth, metronomic rhythm.
“I did feel we were skating really powerfully, we were together the whole time. We were executing really well. When we had two laps to go I was like, ‘oh yeah, this is a good one’,” Weidemann said.
“I had no idea where the Dutch were but I thought we would walk away with something that we are proud of. I can’t believe it’s gold.
“Four years ago, going into Beijing, we were rookies a bit. We were new to this event, we built this team from nothing. Now we’re reigning Olympic champions. The pressure has changed and we’ve had to change our strategy quite a bit. We had to build on our relationships a little bit more this time.”
It was only the third gold medal of the Games for Canada, following Mikael Kingsbury’s win in men’s dual moguls and Megan Oldham’s victory in women’s freestyle skiing big air.
(Reporting by Pearl Josephine Nazare; editing by Clare Fallon and Ed Osmond)
Comments