Who is Luciano Buonfiglio, the new president of Coni

Luciano Buonfiglio does not have the charm of Giovanni Malagò . He does not even have his eloquence. However, he has a past as a sportsman that led him to the election as number one of the Coni paddle stroke after paddle stroke.

Athlete at the Montreal Games in the K4 over 1000 meters, he then pursued a managerial career until becoming president of the Canoe and Kayak Federation in 2005 , a role that will now most likely pass to Antonio Rossi, flag bearer at the Beijing Games. A federation that had 5,500 members and today has 22,000 with a healthy budget, a federal center financed by the Pnrr and many Olympic medals that led him to receive the Golden Collar for Sporting Merit in December 2023. Buonfiglio overwhelmingly won the comparison with Luca Pancalli (47-34) by making continuity prevail . He was Malagò's choice and he won at the first vote after introducing himself with a speech in which he said: "We are pleasantly condemned to continue winning, only in this way can we make people talk about us" .

With him as president, CONI ages by 9 years compared to Giovanni Malagò. Buonfiglio was born in Naples, more precisely in Posillipo, on November 15, 1950, and is obviously a Napoli fan. At the Circolo Posillipo he learned to swim and sail, but it was in Milan where he moved at 15 ("in high school I was ghettoized, it was a stimulus") that he began to love canoeing, until he was called up for the Olympics in 1976, considering the day of the opening ceremony of those Games as the best day of his life. At least until the forty-first ballot with his name was read, the one that at 12:13 sanctioned his victory.

Buonfiglio was an athlete, federal president, but also a business manager until he became general manager of the Alliance Europa group . He is a man who knows Coni and its mechanisms well and who, despite being a candidate for Malagò, wants to leave his own mark: "What should we do? First of all, coordinate with the Government and Sport and Health for a four-year strategic plan. This is why we have created the departments, each of you will be involved in producing initiatives that we have sometimes suffered. We have the strength and expertise to be protagonists and propose those initiatives that must ensure that Coni is always a protagonist in the world. Coni should not be changed, but it must always improve", he said in his presentation speech. How can you blame him.

He was the favorite on the eve, against the candidate of politics and two winning federations such as Federnuoto and Federtennis, and in the end there were no surprises in the ballot box where only he and his opponent got votes, with Carraro who in his speech had stepped aside , leaving the way open to Buonfiglio who he considered the right man because he represented continuity and guaranteed the reconfirmation of Malagò's team, starting with Carlo Mornati, the general manager. His opponents described him as a traitor because at the time of Malagò's first election he changed sides in one night betraying Pagnozzi. But he has always talked about that choice, looking at it from another point of view.

He defines himself as “a sportsman with a single obsession: to be worthy of representing a world that is worth a lot”. Now he has the chance to prove it.

“I brought the enthusiasm and determination of an athlete to my work and the organization of the company to my sport,” he says, telling his story. “ My goal is for everyone at Coni to know what path to take and to give their contribution, as happened in the companies I have been in . Every president is an entrepreneur with specific skills that need to be valued.” He won’t be a Malagò 2 because he is still very different from the president who sponsored him, but he certainly won’t be a revolutionary president.

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