Aspire in the World Fellows Book - 2023

/112 9TH ASPIRE ACADEMY GLOBAL SUMMIT Gianmarco Tamberi: We challenged each other in everything. I did beat him, but I don’t remember the first thing I beat him in. It was in another sport because he was a javelin thrower, not a high jumper. I vividly remember every time I competed in the beginning of my career when I was 17-18 years old. There was a big sportsman in Italy who was much better than me in his own sport. While I was competing, the speaker always said, “And now Gianmarco Tamberi, the brother of Gianluca, he’s an amazing guy.” I had to show them who I am. Gianmarco, do you remember the first time you actually beat your brother? Gianmarco Tamberi: It was in Canada in 2010, at the World Juniors Championship. He was already a celebrity. He was the number one in the world. I remember we met three or four days before the competition. Gianmarco Tamberi: You won the world championship. I didn’t even get in the final. That was the first time we met, but not the moment we became friends. From there, we started meeting each other many times, and we started to understand that probably we would share many moments together. We started to speak together during the competition, to understand how it was and what was the value of the other. We had so many things in common; even though we are opposites on the track. The nice thing is that we have so many things in common, like the love we have for our family, the passion we have when we perform high jump, the way we are really focusing to achieve our goal and the way we respect rules. I’m really proud to share these moments with such a nice guy. You travel on your ownmost of the time, and perhaps it was agood idea tocreate relationshipswith the people youwere competing against. Howdid you twomeet? Mutaz Barshim: I remember it very well because I was walking with a colleague to the food courts to get some lunch. He just walked up to me: “Oh man, you’re crazy. How are you?” Then I tell my friends, this guy is crazy and very passionate. That was the first impression of meeting this guy. Two or three days later, we competed against each other. Do you remember what happened next?