The curtain falls on Gangwon 2024 and the Italia Team waves goodbye to South Korea as its star. For the first time in an Olympic event – junior or senior – the CONI team ended at the top of the medals table (won one day in advance), with an overall record number of golds (11): a feat never before achieved by any other country in the history of the Winter Youth Olympic Games.

Mission Chief Alessio Palombi’s Azzurrini take their leave of the Gangneung Olympic Park, parading behind Zoe Bianchi and Pietro Rota, the two not-yet-15-year-old skaters chosen as flag-bearers in the last act of this fourth edition of the YOG.

The screens showed highlights from the 13 days of competition and many celebrated the moments that these youngsters, who represent the future of Italian sport, gave us: 18 podiums, with 11 gold, 3 silver and 4 bronze medals.

They are “our pride”, as they were defined yesterday by the CONI President, Giovanni Malagò, who was present in South Korea for the opening ceremony on 19 January, as well as the Secretary General, Carlo Mornati, who spent the first part of this adventure with the youngsters, which saw the participation of 1,803 athletes (925 boys and 878 girls) representing 78 National Olympic Committees.

It was a fantastic parade, which began with flag-bearer Flora Tabanelli, winner of two gold medals in freeskiing (slopestyle and big air) and the perfect representative of the strongest ever Italia Team in the history of the YOG.

Then came the glorious results from luge (6 medals), alpine skiing (4 medals), biathlon (3), Nordic combined (2) and cross-country skiing (1), with our 74 Azzurrini on the podium in 6 of the 13 disciplines in which they took part (Italy did not compete in bobsleigh and skeleton). Eighteen jewels in the richest ever haul of YOG medals. Innsbruck 2012 (with a total of 5 medals), Lillehammer 2016 (9) and Lausanne 2020 (8) are light years away; the here and now is Gangwon 2024 and, as the International Olympic Committee itself acknowledged, “Italy shines brightly”.