Athletics World Championships, Iapichino sixth and in tears

From our correspondent Claudio Lenzi

August 20th
– Budapest

Larissa Iapichino’s first world final ends in tears. Apart from the gold of the Serbian Ivana Vuleta at 7.14 (+1.2), both the silver of the American Tara Davis-Woodhall (6.91/+0.5) and the surprising bronze of the Romanian Alina Rotaru-Kottman (6.88/+1.6) were at the reach of the 21-year-old winner of three stages of the Diamond League this year, the champion of athletics. The long hugs from her friend-opponents aren’t enough to console her, the blue’s match is practically over after the first null jump, in which Gianni Iapichino’s pupil slipped on the plasticine, risking getting hurt. From there fear took over and only in the last jump did a decent 6.82 arrive, however not enough to get on the podium.

LOST OPPORTUNITY

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And to think that Iapichino, thanks to her second position in the world ranking of the long shot, arrived at this appointment with the underdogs. However, her lack of experience in major international events played a bad joke on her, ending up nullifying even a particularly good moment of form, as demonstrated by her 6.95 points achieved a month ago in Monaco, in the Diamond League.