Battocletti, Farah, Ingebritsen (FIDAL Archive)

EuroCross-Country history: fourth time in Italy

Italy becomes the first country to host the European cross-country championships for the fourth time, with the 28th edition of "Piemonte 2022" which will have the Parco della Mandria in Venaria Reale as stage, just six years after the event organized in 2016 in Chia, the championship had also made a stop in San Giorgio su Legnano in 2006 and previously in Ferrara in 1998. All events that have indelibly marked the history of the event, among news and confirmations, with the launch of emerging talents on the international scene.

FERRARA 1998 - When Eurocross arrived in Ferrara in 1998, it experienced a day full of significant moments. It is the beginning of Serhiy Lebid’s era, the first of his nine individual victories. The Ukrainian athlete is exalted on the last lap, where he reaches and overtakes the leading trio: the Belgian Mohammed Mourhit, who had been the best european athlete in the last two World Championships, ahead of the French Driss El Himer and the Dane Carsten Jorgensen, defending champion, then fifth. It is also the first gold medal for Paula Radcliffe, the British who makes purists turn up their noses due to her stagger pace, destined to move the boundaries of the women's marathon. Jubilation for the Azzurri who graduate as European team champions, for the first time, with a compact and well-matched line up: Giuliano Battocletti to guide them, seventh, with the cross-country man Gabriele De Nard in twelfth place, Umberto Pusterla fifteenth and captain Gennaro Di Napoli nineteenth, all in the top twenty, in a team completed by Luciano Di Pardo and Francesco Bennici.

SAN GIORGIO SU LEGNANO 2006 – It moves to the Campaccio field, a traditional place for the specialty, which in 2006 celebrates its fiftieth anniversary with the European Championships in San Giorgio su Legnano. And it makes it in style on the Sunday that sees the 'Brit' Mo Farah acquire fame, thanks to the first pearl of a unique career. Ukraine also wins: not with Lebid, who collapsed in the final and finished twelfth, but with his compatriot Tetyana Holovchenko, female gold. It is the edition in which the under 23 races are introduced, which contribute to enrich the italian medal display case. But the under 20s succeed the most with the sensational triumph of Andrea Lalli (first individual title for Italy) and also in teams. For the hosts there is a valuable second place in the medal display (two golds, one silver, two bronzes including Daniele Meucci's U23) behind Great Britain only.

CHIA 2016 - The rest is recent history at Chia 2016. Turkey scores a double in the individual senior races: Aras Kaya among the men, the two European track champion Yasemin Can among the women who get on the podium also as team. This time the new name comes from the under 20s with the success of a certain Jakob Ingebrigtsen who at 16 takes his first international title: a prelude to poker in this category but, above all, to the triumphs on the track at senior level for the Norwegian phenomenon, while in women there is the encore of the German Konstanze Klosterhalfen, another prodigy athlete of European middle distance. The Azzurri rejoice: the national anthem plays for the under 23 men's team that wins the gold medal, dragged by Yeman Crippa who is bronze, and in the under 20 race Yohanes Chiappinelli takes silver, under a sun that feels more spring than winter in the most southern point of Sardinia.