News28 Feb 2010


Donato bounces back with world-leading 17.39m leap in Ancona

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Fabrizio Donato en route to his 17.39m leap at the 2010 Italian indoor champs (© Claudio Petrucci/FIDAL)

Ancona, ItalyReigning European Indoor champion Fabrizio Donato leaped to a world-leading 17.39m victory in the Triple Jump on Sunday to highlight the Italian Indoor Championships in Ancona this weekend. 

Donato also produced a second best jump of 17.22m in the third attempt where he took off with about 20 cm to spare from the board, which means that the Italian is back to 17.40- 17.50m territory and may become one of the major medal contenders for the upcoming IAAF World Indoor Championships in Doha.

With his 17.39m in the sixth round Donato takes the lead in the world seasonal list ,overtaking Christian Olsson’s 17.32 from last weekend in Birmingham by seven centimetres.

“I am back,” Donato said. “I started my preparation for this season last September. After being sidelined by a serious injury I promised myself to work harder than before to return to my best form. We have a great group of triple jumpers in Italy. This gives me extra motivation.”

Schwazer back to form

Olympic 50 km walking champion Alex Schwazer also headlined the 41st edition of the Italian Indoor Championships at the modern Banca Marche Palas facility by setting the world seasonal best over the rarely-contested 5 km distance with 18:46.49, the fourth fastest time ever indoors in history in Italy. The previous world seasonal best was held by Frenchman Yohan Diniz who clocked 18:47.57. It was a good speed test for the Italian walking star who will make his seasonal debut over the 50 km distance in Signa at the Italian 50 km Race Walking Championships next week.

“I have trained very well at 2200 metres altitude in Pico del Teide near Tenerife,” Schwazer said. “Today I pushed the pace from the beginning to test my shape.”

Schwazer’s solid form is shown by his recent Italian all-time best over the 35 km distance of 2:26:16 set in Montalto di Castro at the end of January. The Italian star is back after dropping out at the World Championships in Berlin and is ready to grab the headlines in Chihuahua and Barcelona later in the year.

Another double for Cusma

European indoor 800m bronze medallist Elisa Cusma scored a double by winning the women’s 800 and 1500m respectively in 2:06.60 and 4:19.45 in her first outings of 2010 after a training period in South Africa. Ancona marked the start of the season for the Italian middle-distance star who pulled out of the Birmingham meeting last week due to a minor injury.

“I felt very well,” Cusma said. “I wanted to test my form and find again the adrenaline of competitions before Doha. Apart from a small injury problem, my preparation went according to plans.” Cusma said that her final pre-Doha tune-up may come in the 1000m next Friday in Liévin, France.

Cusma, who was sixth at both the World indoor and outdoor championships in the 800m, is also the Italian indoor record holder with 1:59.25, and is one of the biggest Italian hopes for the World Indoor Championships. Apart from Cusma and Donato the other big Italian names expected to make the trip to Doha is former World outdoor champion Giuseppe Gibilisco who vaulted 5.70m in Dessau last week before missing three narrow attempts at 5.84m, but did not compete in Ancona.

Another much-awaited competition on the eve of the Italian Champs was the women’s Pole Vault, an event which produced two Italian records two weeks ago thanks to Elena Scarpellini who cleared 4.4m0 in Ancona on 6 February equalling the national indoor record held by Anna Giordano Bruno. The latter responded a few hours later by clearing 4.50m in Udine. This weekend’s championships final did not fulfill expectations of a new national record but the battle for the Italian title was tight. Giordano Bruno did not manage to clear 3.90m and did not finish higher than sixth. The win went on a count-back to Scarpellini, a former European Junior bronze medallist, who vaulted 4.30m on her first attempt, while former national team gymnast Giorgia Benecchi, who set the Italian Under 23 record with 4.36m at the National Under 23 Champs in Ancona two weeks ago, needed two attempts to clear 4.30m. Scarpellini then failed twice at 4.40m and once at 4.45m.  

Italian middle distance running will be represented in Doha by Mario Scapini, the 2007 European Junior champion in the 1500m, who clocked a winning 3:45.38 this weekend. He will contest the 800m in the Qatari capital, a distance in which he qualified last week on the same Ancona track with 1:47.51. Olympic 1500m finalist Christian Obrist took a very narrow win over Stefano La Rosa in a tactical men’s 3000m in 8:09.76 after a close battle in the final straight.

The men’s High Jump went to Giulio Ciotti who won with 2.24m on a countback over Andrea Bettinelli. Doha-bound Alessandro Talotti, who qualified for the World Indoors thanks to his 2.28m in Hustopece, finished third with 2.21m. 

In the absence of 2007 World silver medallist Antonietta Di Martino, who has been sidelined by a virus problem this winter, the women’s High Jump went to Raffaella Lamera who cleared a lifetime best of 1.90m, the fifth all-time best performance in Italy. 

Last year’s 60m European Indoor finalist Maria Aurora Salvagno booked her berth for Doha thanks to her 7.37 win.  

The weekend also produced some good junior results.  The most impressive was produced by 17-year-old Daniele Secci who smashed the long-standing Paolo Dal Soglio’s Italian junior Shot Put record with the 7.260kg implement four times with a best  18.38m which earned him second place behind Marco Di Maggio (18.47m) but ahead of veteran Paolo Dal Soglio (former European Indoor champion in 1996) in a generation’s game. Secci, who will turn 18 on 9 March, already holds the Italian outdoor record with the 6 kg implement with 20.00m set in early 2010 and won the Gymnasiade in Doha last December.

Diego Sampaolo for the IAAF
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