Ten thousand torchbearers, plus one from all over the world , including Sardinians. And a man from Sinnai: Pablo Orrù, 49, a former rugby player now an ultramarathon runner. "A dream come true," he says.

The 2026 Milan-Cortina Winter Olympics will begin on February 6th and conclude on the 22nd, and the organization is in full swing. The torch will depart, traveling 12,000 kilometers in 63 days, carried by volunteers through all of Italy's provinces and regions.

Including our island . Each torchbearer will carry the Olympic symbol for a few hundred meters along a route that starts in Rome (departing on December 6th) and passes through Viterbo, Terni, Perugia, Siena, Florence, and Livorno before touching down in Nuoro on the 13th and Cagliari the following day. Then they depart for Palermo and continue the journey, finishing in Verona on January 18th. Orrù has to give a definitive answer by September 8th, but it's as if he's already submitted it . "I'd never put in the effort to figure out how to do it, but my wife looked into it and encouraged me to try," Orrù emphasizes. The application spaces on the Games website were already filled, so he approached the main sponsors, sending them a sort of CV outlining his athletic history.

Coca-Cola responded . "They announced a confirmation email for July 31st, but it never arrived, so I thought I'd been rejected. Instead, on August 25th they informed me of the decision: they've signed me." Orrù played rugby for 40 years with the 7 Fradis Sinnai team, which reached the national C1 league (now Serie B) with a best result of third place. Always with a ball in his hands, he spent four decades on the sports field before dedicating himself to ultra trail running, mountain races that can exceed 100 kilometers.

"In my candidacy, I described my life in rugby, which, in my opinion, embodies the essence of the Olympics: respect, fun, competitiveness, brotherhood, peace. I was guided by my father, president of the club for twenty years. Today I train every day for two hours or more. I go to our Pineta, an open-air gym, and to the Sette Fratelli." Now the torch: "It would truly be an honor." He will be joined by his friend Roberta Pisano, an athlete with UrbanRunnres Cagliari, also 49 but from Quartu, who had her fortune with Eni.

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