It was a fiery evening on Monday 29 July for Italian sport at the Paris Olympics. The cover rightfully went to Thomas Ceccon who devoured the 100 meters backstroke to take a dreamed, constructed and deserved gold. The Italian brought the Tricolore to the first step of the podium as his teammate Martinenghi had done 24 hours earlier. Two victories that embellish the medal table and give extraordinary emotions, on a par with those of Benedetta Pilato and Filippo Macchi.

The foil fencer was one step away from the most precious metal at the end of a memorable ride, losing the final only at the last thrust, amidst a thousand controversies. The referee made a mistake, everyone thundered, his coach first and foremost, followed closely by the president of Coni Malagò who even launched accusations on the referee designation, with two Asians deciding the fate of the Italy-Hong Kong final. A sort of culture of suspicion swept away with a post on social media directly from Filippo Macchi: “I heard that I was robbed, yet I feel like saying that I am a lucky boy, I came second in the most important competition for every athlete. I know both referees, I don’t feel like pointing the finger at them also because it would lead to nothing, I have learned that the referees’ decisions must always be respected”. Honestly, in the midst of that jumble of comments, better words could not be found. The fact that they were said by the only one who was on the platform yesterday should be a great lesson for all those who talk too much about “theft” and “robbery”, concepts that clash with sport and not a little.

Just before the men’s foil final, Benedetta Pilato was the star in the swimming pool in Paris, missing out on the podium by just one hundredth of a second. An incalculable disappointment to which the 19-year-old responded with tears of joy and a phrase that should have been met with open applause: “It’s the best day of my life.” And instead, even in the world of sports, the typical response of these difficult times in which those who watch from the outside only praise you if you win has arrived. Benedetta didn’t lose, because she came in fourth, fighting tooth and nail against the best athletes in the world, and yet many almost took her for crazy for that happiness, wondering what there was to celebrate in that “miserable” fourth place. Well, if you can’t understand that sport is also this, that for a hundredth of a second you can fly to Heaven or stay on the ground, that victories aren’t just medals, then very little is understood about sport and we shouldn’t talk about it in front of millions of television viewers. Benedetta cried because she gave it her all in the pool, she felt that those three years of preparation for the most important event of her career cannot be erased by a hundredth of a second. The real victory is perhaps this, looking back and understanding that the journey matters and that winning is beautiful but not always possible.