Aurora Berton

Happy birthday to Italy’s sprinter Aurora Berton, a Mediterranean Games gold medallist who is enlisted in the Guardia di Finanza and qualified to look after animals.

In July 2022 at Oran, Aurora ran a leg of the Italian 4x100m that won **gold at the Mediterranean Games** in 43.68, alongside Irene Siragusa, Gloria Hooper and Johanelis Herrera. Five months later the Italian federation announced she had been enlisted into the Gruppo Sportivo Fiamme Gialle, the sports corps of the Guardia di Finanza, which in Italy means the corps employs her to be an athlete. She has been in their colours ever since.

This year she came back to the front. On 1 March at the Italian Absolute Indoor Championships in Ancona she took the **bronze medal over 60m in 7.31**, and the federation ran a piece on it headlined simply: Aurora Berton, in the spotlight at the Assoluti. She has since been called into two national 4x100m relay training camps in Rome, and in July she won a 100m in Novo Mesto in 11.62. Her 200m best of 23.46 was set at Tolentino last June, at twenty-four.

She has titles of her own: Italian U23 indoor 60m champion, Italian U23 outdoor 200m champion, and a share of the Italian U23 4x100m national best of 43.65, run in the final at the European U23 Championships in Tallinn.

And the rest of her is not a sprinter’s CV at all. Aurora did ten years of classical dance before athletics ever got hold of her, at twelve. She holds a degree in animal husbandry and health from the University of Udine, which qualifies her as a veterinary nurse. She plays guitar and takes photographs. She is from Palmanova, the star-shaped fortress town in Friuli, and trains in Fano under Andrea Pagliarini.

Buon compleanno, Aurora! Cento di questi giorni, in pista e fuori. Auguri! 🎂🎁🎉🫶🫶🇮🇹