Italian swimming-fencing fiancés Gregorio Paltrinieri and Rossella Fiamingo win medals in same hour at Paris 2024 Olympics
The Paris La Defense Area was overflowing with love for Italian swimmer Gregorio Paltrinieri after he won a medal at a third consecutive Olympic Games on Tuesday, 30 July.
The seats that were packed with his family and friends, who the athlete rushed to as soon as he got off the podium, were especially boisterous. One important person was missing from that support group, however. His fiancée, who was also in Paris, was too busy to come and watch Paltrinieri win his fourth Olympic medal.
The swimmer did not mind.
At the exact same moment as Paltrinieri dove into the pool for the men's 800m freestyle, his fiancée Rossella Fiamingo was helping the Italian team win a gold medal in fencing at the Grand Palais, some 7.5 kilometres away.
"Not yet, because I just got out, but I can't wait to see her," Paltrinieri told Olympics.com when asked if the couple has had a chance to swap images of their Olympic medals in a video call. "(We're) just texting a little bit, but I can't wait to be back in the Village."
Four-time Olympians Paltrinieri and Fiamingo met at the Olympic Games Tokyo 2020 and have since gotten engaged.
Ambitious as only athletes can be, they put love aside on the night of their dual finals to focus only on competition. And it paid off. After Tuesday's medal haul, the future husband and wife have seven Olympic medals between them, including one gold for each of them.
“(The night before the race) I told him I didn’t want to see his race, not for anything bad but because I was in the final too," Fiamingo told Olympics.com. "We both knew we wanted these medals and tonight we wanted to come back with a medal each to celebrate. One wasn’t enough. We both wanted to be happy with our performances."
Fiamingo was done with her bout in a tense Italy-France epee team final minutes before Paltrinieri began the 800m freestyle race. After 7:39.38 minutes, he had secured his bronze medal.
His fiancée had to wait a bit longer to find out her fate as the fencing clash went into overtime. But shortly after, she also got her Olympic reward.
“The first thing I asked (CONI President) Giovanni Malago when I saw him was ‘How did Greg do?’. I wanted to know about that," Fiamingo recalled. "People take for granted that Greg is phenomenal and must always win.
"He is great in the swimming world. At his age, he’s always super competitive against anyone. I’m really proud of him. After all he has won, he’s still hungry for more.
"We texted each other after the (fencing semi-final) match against China and he told me, ‘You have motivated me a lot’, and I was happy to see how motived he was after watching my competition and how motivated he would be for his race.
"After that we didn’t manage to get in touch anymore because I had to do my stuff, I had to focus, but my thoughts were for him too. I couldn’t wait to finish and win and to find out about him. Now we can celebrate."
Both hailed as examples of consistency and longevity in their sports, 29-year-old Paltrinieri said he and Fiamingo owe it to each other that they managed to get on a Paris 2024 podium on the same night.
"What we do, sport, is really complicated, but really exciting for us to to keep doing this," Paltrinieri said. "It's full of ups and downs all the time, but for sure we motivate ourselves and we try to support each other. It's great to be on the podium the same day."
While the Paris 2024 competition is over for Fiamingo, Paltrinieri still has two more races to go – the men's 1500m in the pool and the 10km in marathon swimming.
And this time around, Fiamingo will make sure to support him from the stands.
"He still has more opportunities to win medals and I will be here to watch all of them," the champion fencer said. "I’m on holiday now and I will be supporting him. I will try to keep him calm and make him enjoy everything.
"He’s in good shape and I hope for the best for him.”