Italy won the gold medal in the men's team pursuit speed skating at the Milan-Cortina Olympics .

Italian athletes Davide Ghiotto, Andrea Giovannini, and Michele Malfatti defeated the United States in the final . After a strong start by the Americans, who led until the halfway point, Italy began to grind out the pace, outclassing their opponents and leaving them behind by 4.5 seconds, a huge gap . In the semifinal, the Italians defeated the Netherlands. The bronze medal went to China , who won the final against the Netherlands by just 0.9 seconds. This triumph comes twenty years after the last Olympic gold medal won in the discipline, in Turin 2006: if today Davide Ghiotto was leading Italy, back then it was Enrico Fabris.

Italy's opulent medal collection continues to grow, with the country now second only to Norway in both gold and medal winning numbers.

There are now 24 medals in total, smashing the record of 20 from the Lillehammer '94 Games. Specifically, 9 golds (also a record), 4 silvers and 11 bronzes .

The men's biathlon relay , however, had a performance to forget, partly due to a poor choice of equipment. Italy's Patrick Braunhofer, Lukas Hofer, Nicola Romanin, and Tommaso Giacomel finished 14th, nearly 4.5 minutes behind champion France . Norway took silver, and Sweden bronze.

(Unioneonline/L)

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