“Molise exists and leads strongly.” Thanks to this sentence pronounced by Maria Centracchio on July 27 in Tokyo, even the youngest and least known region of Italy becomes the protagonist of the unforgettable sporting summer of 2021. Her Olympic bronze conquered in judo is the highest point of a career started in Isernia and built with effort and tenacity. A story full of falls and climbs, which demonstrates how sacrifice and work can make the biggest dreams come true. Maria looks like a predestined one: her father, former athlete of international level and then teacher; the elder brother Italian champion, the younger one gold at the youth Olympics. Instead, an incredible series of injuries, followed by mononucleosis and finally by Covid, transforms qualification for the Japanese Games into a seemingly impossible climb. Until the prodigious recovery, wet with tears on the most prestigious tatami in the world, celebrated by its people as the redemption of the “region that does not exist”.
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