To announce it is the same Google doodle of the day, which presents a discus thrower, symbol figure of the Olympic Games since ancient times: great athletics enters the scene in London today, the queen discipline of the Olympics, to which, as per tradition, the second week is dedicated, after having left the first to swimming.
To tell the truth, the two symbolic disciplines of the Games will intersect for two days, giving life to the Super Saturday of August 4th, which sees the last four finals in the pool scheduled (including the 1.500m freestyle with our Paltrinieri among the favourites) and as many as 6 medals up for grabs in the Olympic Stadium of the English capital: the finals of the women's 100m and the along men, in addition to the 20 km walk with Giorgio Rubino in search of an enterprise.
The next day, Sunday 5 August, the highlight arrives: at 22.50 pm Italian time the most awaited race is staged, the final of the men's 100 meters with the great duel all made in Jamaica between Usain Bolt and Yohan Blake. The two will repeat, always as favorites, in the 200 meters scheduled for Thursday evening while two days later they will in all probability drag the Central American island to the gold medal in the 4×100 relay.
That day, Saturday 11 August, will also be that of Alex Schwazer in the 50 km walk, one of the few Italian medal hopefuls in a sector, that of athletics, very far from the glories of the past and moreover an orphan of Antonietta Di Martino and Andrew Howe. Schwazer is the reigning Olympic champion and is aiming for reconfirmation, even if Sports Illustrated doesn't predict him even on the podium.
The American Sports Bible (which has generously predicted 31 medals in total for Italy) instead even sees the gold medal around the neck of the triple jumper Fabrizio Donato. The final is on 9 August at 21.20 Italian time, the European champion from Helsinki is in good shape but he will have to beat the competition from the world champion Taylor and above all from the landlord Idowu.
However, the bow arrows of the blue national team should stop here. In sprint, the only athlete for the final (but not for the medal) could be Libiana Grenot in the 400m. The relays themselves are very far from the levels of just two years ago, with the men's 4×100 that could only enter the final due to problems of others given the recent appearances and the quality of the quartet.
In middle-distance and long-distance, historically favorable disciplines, we are decidedly under-represented: completely absent from 800 and 1.500, hopes are all in Daniele Meucci in the 10 thousand, distance over which he is bronze and European silver in 2010 and 2012. In the men's marathon there is only Ruggero Pertile, the last athlete who survived the golden age of the Italian marathon, who will try to enter the top 10. The girls are better, qualified in three and all on the top ten card.
In the jumps, in addition to Fabrizio Donato there is Simona Lamantia in the triple women who after the fool of Daegu seeks redemption,motivated by the fourth place in Helsinki and by a very low average level compared to a few years ago.
The other top moments, in addition to the Bolt-Blake duel, will be the performance of the home athlete Mo Farah in the 5.000m, who challenges the Kenyans to bring another gold to Great Britain; the return of the Chinese Liu Xiang after the mockery of Beijing, in search of an encore in Athens 2004 in the 110m hurdles (the duel is always with the Cuban Dayron Robles); the desire for revenge of the eternal Yelena Isinbayeva in the pole vault, and then the endless USA-Jamaica duels in both the men's and women's relays.
