Luca Stefani
Luca Stefani (born 22 February 1987 in Asiago ) is an Italian speed skater.
After Stefani had already decided in his early career years, some junior race for himself, he took in February 2004 for the first time at the all-around world championship of juniors in part, where he succeeded as the best result a ninth rank with the team. A year later he was Italian Junior Champion in the small four- fight and was able to establish itself in the following seasons in the advanced world's top juniors. This meant that he was first appointed at the World Cup kick-off of the winter 2006/ 07 in the Italian World Cup team. With particularly in the second half of the season consistently good results, the Italians qualified on the 1500 - meter course for the A group, which included the 20 best skaters over the distance. He also was in February 2007 in Turin for the first time on the World Cup podium when he took third place with team Olympic champions Matteo Anesi and Enrico Fabris in the team race.
In the following winters Stefani did not make it to establish itself on the individual routes in the A group, but he reached in the B group several top ten places. Much more successful ran the starts in the team race: Together with Anesi and Fabris won the Italians in March 2008, the silver medal at the single distance world championships in Nagano. There were also in the seasons 2008/ 09 and 2009/10, three more podium finishes. The next career highlight came in February 2010 when Stefani took part in the Winter Olympics in Vancouver. There, however, the Italian team was eliminated early and eventually finished sixth among eight nations. In his only single start on the 5000 meters at this time the 22 -year-old as 25 also reached the third last position while his team-mate as the best Italian Fabris good seventh.