Ninna, four World Cup victories, has also written a book: “When I hug Fede she stiffens. I stopped being a journalist so as not to damage her. She is very strong in the head, she makes miraculous progress”
We are republishing the interviews most appreciated by readers of the Gazzetta dello Sport in 2025. The one with Ninna Quario was published on 26 November.
I was very small, always the smallest. If I finished second, I would get on the podium and get to the knees of first place. I was really tiny.” Ninna Quario displays her tenderness in the memory of that little girl who desperately wanted her first victory. “To go faster to the finish line I shot straight, I didn’t make a goal.” Four victories in the World Cup, the Pink Valanga was born on the day in which the seventeen-year-old Ninna won in the World Series at the Stelvio and second was Claudia Giordani, fourth Wilma Gatta, fifth Daniela Zini, seventh Bieler, eighth Gamper: six Italians in the top eight. “The Gazzetta headlined: the female Blue Avalanche. It took a few more days to get around to writing Pink Valanga. We were the first women’s team to get people talking, until that moment Italian women’s sport was made up of individuality: Calligaris, Ragno, Simeoni, Pigni, Giordani. But Marta Bassino alone has won more than us put together, the real Avalanche is now. Sofia Goggia has won 26 times, Federica Brignone 37. You can’t even make a comparison.”
Federica Brignone is his daughter.
“One day they stopped saying she was my daughter, suddenly I became Brignone’s mother. It was when Fede achieved his first podium in the Cup, in 2009. Now even friends introduce me to other people by saying: ‘She is Brignone’s mother’. I would like to say: ‘Oh, I’m Ninna’… I’m joking, I’m happy.”
How are you similar?
“In energy, in being tireless. And then in determination, in competitiveness, we are two big heads.”
How are you different?
“She is much stronger than me. Even in her head: I would throw myself down in difficulties, Fede reacts much better. We are different in the car: she goes fast, I go slow, I hate speed and all things too adrenaline-filled. Which instead are her bread and butter. She is much more feminine than me: she wears make-up, dresses, dances well. I am denied dancing, walking in heels, I fall to the floor. In my day we were badly dressed. Now they are all beautiful.”
How much has skiing changed in the last 40 years?
“A lot. Today, athletes are professionals from every point of view: in how they train, in how they earn. For goodness sake, I bought a car at 18, but it’s not comparable to today. I trained by playing tennis in the summer. I ran downhill, which is the best way to destroy your knees and hurt yourself. And also from the point of view of materials: we had skis that didn’t turn, honestly I think I ski better today at 64 than when I won in the World Cup. World. Not to mention the length of his career: at 24, the age at which I stopped, Fede had not yet won his first race.”
Did you ski together when you were little?
“I skied with her until she was six months pregnant. She stole her first plastic skis from a shop. At two years old we took her on the steepest sections between our legs, she loved it.”
“No, we are mother and daughter. I almost have more confidence with Davide, who tells me everything, he is more cuddly. If I hug him, Fede stiffens.”
The Olympics were his worry.
“A nightmare. My first time, in Lake Placid, in 1980, I was 18 years old, and I had started the season as number one in the world in slalom. But I had fallen in love with the team doctor, I had gone a bit mentally haywire. At that age, great love can have this effect, the races were a disaster, I never finished, I fell. They told me I would do the giant slalom, but not the slalom. It was a shock because I didn’t believe to deserve the exclusion. Two days before the slalom, one of the others fell ill and it was my turn: fourth by 3 hundredths, the best result of the entire Italian skiing expedition. Instead, at the second Olympics, in Sarajevo, I showed up in great shape but I caught cold in the opening ceremony and got ill: I came in seventh, and it was truly a great disappointment. That race was won by Paola Magoni, who was certainly not the favourite.
She made nine more Olympics as a journalist, the last four also as a mother.
“I have always loved writing. I have kept a diary since March 1974, I already liked telling stories then.”
Now a book has been born from his diary: “Two Lives”. His and Federica’s.
“He’s reading it, he says he enjoys it.”
Has writing about skiing created problems for you with Federica?
“No. I often wrote in the first person, as a mother, those were the articles that came out best. Interviewing her was fun. But when it went badly and I had to interview the others it wasn’t the best.”
Why did you stop being a journalist three years ago?
“I was a little disappointed by a certain way of doing journalism, and I understood that I could be harmful to Fede. I understood that the time had come to stop”.
Will you go to Cortina for these Olympic competitions?
“If Fede competes, I’ll be there. You shouldn’t be optimistic in life because otherwise you’ll be in trouble. He’s making almost miraculous progress, but everything depends on when he puts on skis.”
Are you afraid when your children ski?
“I’m afraid they’re disappointed, I’m afraid they’re not well. I don’t have control over their lives and so the answer is no. I’m confident.”
Federica is 35 years old. Should he stop?
“She wants to be the one to decide, she doesn’t want to do it due to an injury. But it’s a taboo topic: I try not to stress her out because everyone has been asking her about the Olympics for months.”
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