It was a Paralympics atypical for Fabrizio Di SommaAfter his past as a protagonist with two medals (1 silver and 2 bronzes) in Sydney 2000 as guide of Silvana Valente, two world titles and several World Cup podiums, followed by twelve years as coach (from 2010 to 2021) of the Italian paracycling, this time he followed the Paris 2024 review as a spectator.
However, he is not lacking the desire to express his opinion on what he saw as an external observer after having to leave his post at the end of the Tokyo adventure. It seems that at the base there was also a letter written by the athletes to the Federation, who then contributed to the change at the helm of the Italian Paralympic national team, entrusted to Pierpaolo Addesi and Silvano Perusini.
Fabrizio, how did you follow the Games?
Partly on TV. I wasn't able to follow all the races, but I studied the final results thoroughly, knowing all the interpretersHowever, there were several things I didn't like, such as the decision to move the Olympic competitions to the heart of Paris and the Paralympic competitions to the suburbs, with very few spectators.
Other things that struck coach Di Somma?
I've seen a lot of comments about the classifications. While perfection will never be achieved in paracycling, one must realize that the number of races can no longer be increased because it would decrease public interestBut that's not all…
What are you referring to?
With the increase in the number of athletes compared to previous editions, there has been a revolution especially from the bottom. Compared to World Cups and World Championships, however, the choice was made to favour small nations, giving slots to developing countries.. This eliminated the possibility of inclusion for all the so-called outsiders from the major nations, that is, the athletes who during the season fluctuated between 5th and 8th place in international competitions. In this way, the strong nations brought only podium-winning athletes, leaving at home those who could at least threaten the medal positions. Without the intermediate athletes, many races had a predictable progression and were less attractive than those of the World Cup. In my opinion, there was less spectacle than in Rio 2016 and Tokyo 2020 and the IPC should do something to reverse the trend.
What would you like to add about the Italian national team, which equaled its road haul from Tokyo and added a bronze on the track?
What struck me about the Italian expedition is that the medals were all taken by athletes who were already part of the national team with the previous staff or were in any case in the orbit. Already at the first post-Covid gathering, for example, we had our eye on Mirko Testa, who had stood out in the Giro d'Italia handbike races, but didn't make it to Tokyo in time. Like Martini Pini, who even competed in the 2021 pre-Paralympic World Championships.
But the Bernard-Plebani duo was an intuition of the new staff…
We contacted Lorenzo first, on September 21, 2021, ask him too for confirmation. He had done a test on the rollers and then an outing with Riccardo Panizza, who he had also attended Fabio Triboli. In practice, we had also found him, while obviously we could not think of plebani Because until 2021, he was still working with able-bodied athletes. Therefore, he wouldn't have been able to approach the Paralympic sector until 2022.
So, are you contesting the paternity of the medals?
With respect to the statements made to your website and other media, I want to underline that This is not about any medal coming from new performers. All the athletes were already monitored, with the sole exception of Bernard, which, however, just two weeks after the Tokyo Games, we were already starting to follow. I would have expected from the new management a thank you to those who had laid the foundations in previous years.
What do you do now?
I'm leading a small under-23 team from Abruzzo, ASD Avezzano. We have an agreement until the end of the season. I do some activities with them as a sports director and I'm happy to be back in the flagship
Do you miss the Paralympic sector?
A lot, I have done 5 Paralympics and I would like to do more in the futureBut many things said in the last few months have bothered me, especially certain statementsI didn't expect the team relay victory in Tokyo to even be brought up.
What bothered you?
Hearing that in Japan it was a lucky gold, referring, I think, to the fall of the French. Perhaps we should remember that Since the silver medal in London 2012 at Brands Hatch, Italy has lost very few team relay races among all the world and World Cup competitionsOn the contrary, we won the Games both in Rio 2016 and in Tokyo 2020. Instead, in fact, after Japan, the trend has definitely changed and In Paris, Italy won silver in a competition with just five teams, two of which were Brazil and Thailand., which have always traveled several minutes away from us. I'm adding to this to point out that to bring Mestroni, employed in this test, they left Andrea Tarlao at homeThe latter could have competed in the track pursuit and time trial, where the competition was very strong, but then gone after a medal in the road race, in which he was already world champion. By virtue of this situation, It would have been right to favor another of our movement icons who was about to say goodbye.
Are you referring to Francesca Porcellato?
Her, exactly. In a race where second place, or at least the podium, was almost assured, leave her out of the relay team and deny her the last medal of a stellar career after the one that faded away at individual level in a very disadvantageous situation (classes merged between H1 and H4; ed.) it was not a nice gesture. Francesca deserved that opportunity. I'll add one more thing: it's not right for a Federation to choose technicians who still have to gain Paralympic experience and have to do it on the shoulders of the national team ridersI've heard of problems with the selection criteria Perusini mentioned, but those are always established by the IPC at the beginning of the four-year period and never changed. In our working group led by Valentini, I and the other collaborators dealt with this specifically. Unfortunately, we already knew at the beginning of the four-year period who would not be able to participate in the Games., even winning medals at the world championships.
