The organizers of the Milan-Cortina Winter Games received the Olympic flame on Thursday at a ceremony at the Panathenaic Stadium in Athens, preparing for a 63-day torch relay designed to generate excitement across Italy ahead of the Olympics in February. This was reported by Reuters, writes UNN.
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In a smaller event due to warnings of heavy rain, as was the case with the lighting of the flame in ancient Olympia last week, Milan-Cortina Games organizing committee head Giovanni Malagò received the flame inside the massive marble stadium just over two months before the opening ceremony on February 6.
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Italy, a leading country in winter sports, last hosted the Winter Olympics in 2006 in Turin.
It will be an incredible 63-day adventure. After two decades of waiting, the Olympic flame returns to Italy
Italian Olympic doubles tennis champion Jasmine Paolini was one of the last torchbearers to carry the flame into the Panathenaic Stadium after a nine-day Greek relay following its lighting on November 26 in ancient Olympia.
Later on Thursday, the flame will head to Rome, and on December 6, it will depart from the Stadio dei Marmi to begin an internal journey of 12,000 km, passing through all 20 regions, as well as 110 provinces, and through 60 Italian cities and 300 towns, with a total of 10,001 torchbearers participating.
The Italian relay will pass through famous landmarks such as the Colosseum in Rome and the Grand Canal in Venice, with stops in southern cities such as Palermo and Naples, to generate excitement in regions where winter sports are not as popular.
It will reach Cortina d'Ampezzo on January 26 – exactly 70 years after the opening ceremony of the 1956 Games at the same venue – and will conclude on February 6 at the opening ceremony at the San Siro Stadium in Milan.