Sthat evening, on the straight of the Olympic Stadium in Rome, the Piedmontese sprinter Alessia Succo makes her official entry into the paradise of world athletics by participating in the Golden Gala Pietro Mennea. A call that came in at the last minute to replace the French champion Cyréna Samba-Mayela, who transforms the Italian, at just 17 years and 117 daysin the youngest Italian ever to tread the stage of the Diamond League. A baptism of fire that crowns an impressive outdoor season, lived with our feet on the ground and our eyes fixed on the finish line.
Who is Alessia Succo, a very young Italian talent
Born in Settimo Torinese on 7 February 2009, Alessia Succo took over the destiny of the Italian 100 meters hurdles with disarming naturalness. Seeing her run gives an idea of unusual lightness for such a rigid discipline. Alessia doesn’t climb over the obstacle by force, she caresses it, reducing flight times to a minimum to immediately unload all her power on the tartan. The results of this technical cleaning can be seen in the numbers he is collecting. Only a few days ago, on the Bressanone track, he equaled the European under 18 record by printing a 12.86 which projected it to second place in the all-time world rankings for its category.
A vertical growth began already during the winter in Ancona, when it has the indoor world record of the 60 meter hurdles indoors was shattered, dropping to 8.05. Having gone from the fatigue of the middle distance to the pure speed of the starting blocks, the Settimese athlete is demonstrating that, in addition to physical skills, technical qualities are also fundamental for speed races.
Alessia Succo: what she studies, her passions, her training
Managing the expectations of an entire sports movement while tackling the third year of high school requires uncommon mental stability. Alessia he attended the institute for surveyors in Turina necessary change of path after starting the scientific course to be able to reconcile the hours of study with the daily training sessions led by the coach Pierluigi Crisai.
His life moves in this continuous balance: the planning of classwork with teachers, the cheering of schoolmates and the superstitions of adolescence, like the obstinate search for the number 7 on the match shirt. This very ordinary routine represents her lifeline, the most effective way to not get lost in social media feeds and to always show up at the training ground as the first to arrive and the last to leave.
The idol and the rivalry (which doesn’t exist) with Kelly Doualla
There is a detail that reveals the profound maturity of the new generation of Italian athletics, an Alpha Generation that thinks outside the old patterns of toxic rivalry. Sports news often seeks dualism at all costs with the other phenomenon of Italian speed, Kelly Douallabut Alessia dismantled the narrative by talking about a true complicity, made up of shared fun and mutual stimuli in which envy has no place.
This clean vision of sport reflects the choice of his absolute idol, the 400 hurdles legend Sydney McLaughlin-Levrone. The young Turin girl admires her showcase full of gold, but also her ability to manage injuries, the psychological strength in overcoming dark moments and the perseverance in rebuilding oneself. It’s the idea that character counts more than talent, a lesson in sportsmanship that Alessia Succo applies every time she takes to the track.
Alessia Succo at the Golden Gala: what time she competes, her opponents, future commitments
The Olympic Stadium challenge raises the bar in every sense. Tonight the ten obstacles go from the 76 centimeters of the youth competitions to the 84 centimeters of the professional ones, a structural leap that shifts the technical references of the passage of the second leg. The race is scheduled for 9.28pm. The opponents are i sacred monsters of discipline: female athletes like the Jamaicans Danielle Williams and Megan Simmonds or the Americans Tonea Marshall and Kendra Harrisonall with personal bests consistently under 12.40.
Alessia Succo competing in the 100 m hurdles at the 2025 U20 European Championships in Tampere, Finland. (Photo by Maja Hitij/Getty Images for European Athletics)
Next to them There will also be the other Italian Giada Carmassi, the current national record holder. For Alessia Succo this Roman night must not be an obsessive hunt for the result, but a investment of experience in view of the European under 18 championships in Rieti and gods Under 20 World Cup in Eugene. Those 84 centimeters of wood and metal are just the first real boundary towards the Olympic dream.
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