Venetian gondolas, horses and even a Ferrari will help transport the torch across Italy for the 2006 Turin Winter Olympics.
The Olympic flame begins a 64-day, 11 300km relay through every Italian province on December 8, sailing Venice’s Grand Canal on gondolas, crossing the Dolomites on horseback and parading in a sports car through the Ferrari factory.
The flame will be lit on Sunday in Ancient Olympia, Greece. After a 10-day relay in Greece, the torch will be flown to Rome.
Stefano Baldini, the Italian winner of the men’s marathon at the 2004 Athens Olympics, will be the first of 10 000 torch-bearers. Each will carry the flame for about 400m.
”These 10 000 are an extraordinary symbol of our country’s will to be there, to participate in these Olympics,” Turin organising chief Valentino Castellani said at Tuesday’s torch-relay presentation in Rome.
On its first day in Italy, the torch will pass by St Peter’s Square to receive a blessing from Pope Benedict XVI. Later, soccer stars Francesco Totti of AS Roma and Paolo di Canio of Lazio will set aside the traditional rivalry of their teams to light each other’s torch as they run one after the other in the relay.
Other torch-bearers include Moroccan runner Hicham El Guerrouj, Italy’s national soccer-team coach Marcello Lippi and all Italian gold medallists from the Athens and Salt Lake City Games.
The last torch-bearer, whose name has not been revealed, will light the flame at the opening ceremony in Turin on February 10.
Before then, the torch will speed through the Ferrari plant in Maranello on January 14 and pass from gondola to gondola in Venice on January 17.
On January 26, the flame will return to Cortina d’Ampezzo for the 50th anniversary of the 1956 Winter Games. There, the sleek aluminum torch will be put to the test when it takes to the sky with a ski jumper and journeys on bobsleds and horses.
Despite its simple design, the torch’s internal mechanisms allow it to keep the flame alive with winds of up to 120kph, said designer company Pininfarina SpA.
”Its technical specifications are like those of a small car,” said Andrea Pininfarina, CEO of the Turin-based engineer of Ferraris and Fiats.
A small neighbourhood association in Rome said last week it would block passage of the Olympic torch through its streets because the relay is sponsored by Coca-Cola. Rome mayor Walter Veltroni later said the torch route will not change.
While passing through northern Italy, the torch will also make brief forays into neighbouring Slovenia, Austria, Switzerland and France.
Organizers also announced they have chosen 18-year-old figure skater Carolina Kostner to be Italy’s flag-bearer at the opening ceremony in Turin. Kostner won the bronze medal at the World Figure Skating Championships earlier this year. — Sapa-AP
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Olympic Torch Relay
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