“At first she didn’t like swimming”, says Benedetta Pilato’s father

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AGI – Benedetta Pilato, the new European champion and world record holder of the 50 breaststroke, did not have an immediate shock for the sport which then led her to reap great results. Salvatore Pilato, the father of the 16-year-old, revealed this in an interview with ‘Radio Cittadella’.

“Swimming – he said – is the most complete sport there is and we decided to let him do it. Initially she did not take it well, in the sense that when she saw the water she was a bit hesitant, then as in everything she did it was a click and it went“.

“Tomorrow I’m going to pick her up in Bari”, added Pilate about his daughter’s return to Taranto, his hometown. “Thank you for the example you give to all of us, Benedetta. Taranto is waiting for you, “said Mayor Rinaldo Melucci. Salvatore Pilato, about the first events that took place last night in Taranto (with the facade of the Palazzo di Città and the Aragonese Castle of the Navy illuminated in red and blue , the colors of the city), said he considered them “very important”, adding that “an athlete, especially at that age, can also win medals and trophies but if there is no affection from the people who support you, these medals it’s not that they have all this value. “

© Attila Kisbenedek / AFP

European swimming championships: another image of Francesca Pilato in the race that earned her the world record of 50 breaststroke

About the two results obtained in sequence in Budapest, Salvatore Pilato said that “Benedetta, up to 15 days ago, was very well physically in the sense that she had gone to Rome and had done some tests. She was ready for both distances. For do the 100 and to do the 50 “.

“On Tuesday – he continued – he made the 100, it went well, he did a good race, unfortunately in the Europeans there is a regulation that does not allow all the athletes of the same nation to go forward. Let’s call it the misfortune that she made the third absolute time of all, but the first two were the other two Italians, of which the second did better than her for eight cents. So she – continues Salvatore Pilato referring to her daughter Benedetta – came out of the semifinals “.

This probably gave her a righteous anger, a sporting anger, to make her do this kind of results that, in my opinion, in the distance of the 50 breaststroke sooner or later she would have done them. Because he had a lot of room for improvement, it was just a matter of perfecting certain things. It has arrived now, nice, because in a more important event “.

Then explaining the relationship with his daughter, Salvatore Pilato said that “she and I have a very intense relationship, but not so as to call us after the races. You talk to my wife. And as a consequence, I can know how she is “.

Salvatore Pilato did not watch his daughter’s double business from Taranto on live TV. “Benedetta’s races, especially certain races – he said again – I can’t see them. Those who know me well, know. I should go to a cardiologist urgently. I’m going right away from home – he said – I turn off the Internet and just wait the call from my wife who tells me how things went. Then I can see her on RaiPlay with peace of mind, whether it went well or badly “.

“I think that at that age some failure is part of the growth path. We must not commit suicide for this”, he added. And on Benedetta’s passion for swimming, her father explained how it went: “I swam for about ten years, I also had some good results, we are talking about the distant 80s, but swimming was completely different in all respects. of sight. We swam without headphones, there weren’t all the workouts that there are now “.

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