Venanzio Ortis (born 29 January 1955) is an Italian retired long-distance runner who won two medals at the 1978 European Championships.

Biography

Ortis was born in

Paluzza Paluzza ( fur, Paluce) is a ''comune'' (municipality) in the Province of Udine in the Italian region Friuli-Venezia Giulia. A local term in the Bavarian language for "hello" is . Geography It is located about northwest of Trieste and about nort ...

province of Udine The province of Udine ( it, provincia di Udine, fur, provincie di Udin, sl, videmska pokrajina, Resian dialect, Resian: , german: Provinz Weiden) was a Provinces of Italy, province in the autonomous region Friuli-Venezia Giulia of Italy, borderi ...

. He started racing in 1969 (for a period he also practiced

cross-country skiing Cross-country skiing is a form of skiing where skiers rely on their own locomotion to move across snow-covered terrain, rather than using ski lifts or other forms of assistance. Cross-country skiing is widely practiced as a sport and recreation ...

), and later won the Italian junior titles in the 1000 and 3000 m races. On 16 August 1978, aged 23, he set a new Italian record in the 5000 m at the

Weltklasse Zürich Weltklasse Zürich ( en, World Class Zurich) is an annual, invitation-only, world-class track and field meeting at the Letzigrund in Zürich, Switzerland, generally held at the end of August or beginning of September. Previously one of the IAAF G ...

, obtaining a third place behind

Henry Rono Henry Rono (born 12 February 1952, in Kapsabet) is a Kenyan retired track and field athlete who specialised in various long-distance running events. Although he never competed at the Olympics, Rono is remembered as one of the most prolific coll ...

and

Markus Ryffel Markus Ryffel (born 5 February 1955 in Bern) is a former long-distance runner from Switzerland who won the silver medal in the 5000 metres at the 1984 Summer Olympics in Los Angeles. Biography He set the Swiss record at 13:07.54 min. ...

. In the fast 10,000-metre race of the

1978 European Athletics Championships The 12th European Athletics Championships were held from 29 August to 3 September 1978 in the Stadion Evžena Rošického in Prague, the capital city of Czechoslovakia (present-day Czech Republic). Contemporaneous reports on the event were given i ...

, held in

Prague Prague ( ; cs, Praha ; german: Prag, ; la, Praga) is the capital and largest city in the Czech Republic, and the historical capital of Bohemia. On the Vltava river, Prague is home to about 1.3 million people. The city has a temperate ...

two weeks later, he broke 28 minutes for the first time while finishing second in 27 minutes 31.48 seconds, just four one-hundredths of a second ahead of Aleksandr Antipov of the Soviet Union, and half a second behind Finland's

Martti Vainio Martti Olavi Vainio (born 30 December 1950) is a Finnish former long-distance runner. In Finland he is recognized as the last of the great runners of the famous "V-line", the previous ones being Juha Väätäinen, Lasse Virén, and Pekka Vasala ...

(see, for example, Tapio Pekola et al., eds., EM-Praha 1978 (European Championships in Prague 1978), Kaarina, Finland: Juoksija-lehti (Runner Magazine), 1978). In the slow and tactical 5,000-metre final, he managed to squeeze through the narrow space between Ryffel and the Soviet Union's

Aleksandr Fedotkin Aleksandr Fedotkin (russian: Алекса́ндр Федо́ткин; November 3, 1955 – before 2005) was a long-distance runner who represented the Soviet Union. He won a silver medal at the 1978 European Athletics Championships, tied ...

to sprint to the lead and win by 0.1 seconds. He missed the

1980 Moscow Olympics The 1980 Summer Olympics (russian: Летние Олимпийские игры 1980, Letniye Olimpiyskiye igry 1980), officially known as the Games of the XXII Olympiad (russian: Игры XXII Олимпиады, Igry XXII Olimpiady) and commo ...

due to injury. His last major international track race was the

1981 IAAF World Cup The 3rd IAAF World Cup in Athletics was an international track and field sporting event sponsored by the International Association of Athletics Federations, held on September 4–6, 1981, at the Stadio Olimpico in Rome, Italy. Overall results M ...

event in

Rome , established_title = Founded , established_date = 753 BC , founder = King Romulus (legendary) , image_map = Map of comune of Rome (metropolitan city of Capital Rome, region Lazio, Italy).svg , map_caption ...

, where he placed fourth in 10,000. Plagued by physical problems, Ortis retired in 1983. He is the cousin of the Italian cross-country skier

Manuela Di Centa Manuela Di Centa, (born 31 January 1963) is a former Italian cross-country skier and Olympic athlete. She is the sister of former cross-country skier Giorgio Di Centa and cousin of former track and field athlete Venanzio Ortis. Career Di Centa, ...

Achievements

National titles

He won five times the

national championships A national championship(s) is the top achievement for any sport or contest within a league of a particular nation or nation state. The title is usually awarded by contests, ranking systems, stature, ability, etc. This determines the best team, indi ...

senior Senior (shortened as Sr.) means "the elder" in Latin and is often used as a suffix for the elder of two or more people in the same family with the same given name, usually a parent or grandparent. It may also refer to: * Senior (name), a surname ...

level. *

Italian Athletics Championships The Italian Athletics Championships ( it, Campionati italiani assoluti di atletica leggera) are the national championships in athletics, organised every year by the Federazione Italiana di Atletica Leggera. The first edition, four races only, wa ...

5000 metres The 5000 metres or 5000-metre run is a common long-distance running event in track and field, approximately equivalent to or . It is one of the track events in the Olympic Games and the World Championships in Athletics, run over laps of a stan ...

: 1977 **

10,000 metres The 10,000 metres or the 10,000-metre run is a common long-distance track running event. The event is part of the athletics programme at the Olympic Games and the World Athletics Championships, and is common at championship level events. The race ...

: 1976, 1978 ** Cross country (12 km): 1980 *

Italian Athletics Indoor Championships The Italian Athletics Indoor Championships ( it, Italian Athletics Indoor Championships) are the national championships in Athletics (sport), athletics of the indoor events, organised every year by the Federazione Italiana di Atletica Leggera from ...

3000 metres The 3000 metres or 3000-metre run is a track running event, also commonly known as the "3K" or "3K run", where 7.5 laps are run around an outdoor 400 m track, or 15 laps around a 200 m indoor track. It is debated whether the 3000m shoul ...

: 1978

References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Ortis, Venanzio 1955 births Living people People from the Province of Udine Italian male cross country runners Italian male long-distance runners Athletes (track and field) at the 1976 Summer Olympics Olympic athletes for Italy European Athletics Championships medalists Athletics competitors of Fiamme Oro Mediterranean Games silver medalists for Italy Athletes (track and field) at the 1987 Mediterranean Games Mediterranean Games medalists in athletics Sportspeople from Friuli-Venezia Giulia

Biography

Achievements

National titles

See also

References

External links