As the world tunes in to watch the Olympics in Torino on television, memories of great Olympic athletes of the past rise to the surface. Snippets of unforgettable moments in Olympiad history are aired on TV, comparisons of today's athletes to those of yesteryear are voiced and records set by previous gold medal winners wait to be obliterated.

After repeated budget setbacks, a housing shortage, transportation problems and slow construction at Torino's airport, the Games of the XX Olympiad are finally ready to begin. The Opening Ceremonies, which will include plenty of Italian fashion by such names as Armani and Moschino, initiate the thrill and anticipation for the athletes and fans alike. The torch is brought home and all the flags of the competing countries are paraded around the arena as each country is individually introduced to spectators all around the world.

It takes a superstar to help create the exhilaration and excitement of a world-class competitive event. Italians and Italian Americans have been included on that list of superstars more than once. Who could forget the magnitude and popularity of Alberto Tomba, the superhero of the 1988 and the 1992 Winter Olympics? He was a skiing superstar of legendary proportions and arguably the most popular skier of all time. The brash, aggressive, Italian skier was the marquee attraction of the slopes and the winner of five Olympic medals.

Born on December 19, 1966 to Marco and Mario Grazia Tomba in Castel de Britti (Emilia-Romagna, Bologna), "Tomba la Bomba" (Tomba the Bomb), as he was known amongst his fans, began his professional skiing career at the tender age of 17 when he joined the Italian C2 Team in Sweden. Since then, he has forty-eight World Cup wins, a World Cup overall title, eight World Cup discipline titles, five Olympic medals (three gold, two silver) and four World Championship medals. He is the most decorated alpine skier in Olympic history.

In the Calgary Olympics in 1988, Tomba won the gold medal in both the slalom and giant slalom, becoming the first alpine skier in eight years to win two gold medals at a single Olympic Games. In 1992, he defended his gold title status in the giant slalom and took silver in the slalom. He won his final Olympic medal in 1994 at the Lillehammer Games in Slalom. Tomba retired after the 1998 Nagano Games.

Born in Sondalo (Sondrio, Lombardia), Italy in 1970, Deborah Campagnoni was considered as Italy's female version of Alberto Tomba. But Campagnoni's skiing career wasn't always smooth sailing. She twice suffered torn ligaments in her left knee; she had right knee surgery; she endured a fractured tibia and then underwent emergency surgery to remove two feet of her intestines -- all during the early 90s.

At the Olympics in Nagano in 1998, Campagnoni won her third Olympic gold medal in the giant slalom, making it her third consecutive Olympics to win gold. She won gold in the 1992 Games in Albertville in the super-G and another gold medal in Lillehammer in 1994 the giant slalom, plus three World Titles as late as 1998.

Italians and Italian Americans have dominated in many Olympic areas, not only in skiing. Eric Flaim, an Italian American and four-time Olympian, was inducted into the United States Speed Skating Hall of Fame in 2003. Flaim was the first American to medal in two different winter Olympic sports. He holds two silver medals; one for long track in the 1988 Seoul Olympics (he broke the world record) and another for the 5000-meter short track in the 1994 Lillehammer Games.

After retiring in 1995, the Massachusetts native returned to qualify as a member of the 1998 U.S. Olympic team and was chosen to be the team's flag bearer for the Opening Ceremonies.

Flaim was hired as the US Speed Skating organization's Northeast regional coach in 1998 and works as a TV speed skating commentator. He was a recipient of several scholarships from the National Italian American Sports Hall of Fame in Chicago, IL prior to beginning his speed skating career.

And who will ever forget Brian Boitano, the skater with many "firsts" and who won the 1986 World Championships in Geneva, Switzerland? The Italian American was born in Sunnyvale, CA on October 22, 1963 and was the first American to land the triple axel in 1982; the first skater to attempt a quadruple jump in competition; and he was the skater to introduce a new jump, the Tano triple lutz. Boitano is often credited with raising the bar in figure skating, having added difficult technical elements to the sport.

While defending his World Champion title in 1987 to Canadian Brian Orser, Boitano fell during his performance, paving the way for Orser to take the gold medal. The 1988 competition between Brian Orser and Brian Boitano during the 1988 Seoul Olympics was dubbed "The Battle of Brians." Boitano came out on top at the end of the battle, having earned the gold and landing the cover of Sports Illustrated with a picture of him performing a triple axel from his winning performance, the only magazine ever to feature a male figure skater on its cover. He was also the first American skater to have a TV special, ABC's Brian Boitano, Canvas on Ice. Boitano was inducted into the National Italian American Sports Hall of Fame in 1996.

Two-time world figure champion and Olympic silver medalist, Linda Fratianne, was born in Los Angeles, where her father, the late Robert Fratianne, was the former Superior Court Judge. Fratianne was the first woman to include two triple jumps in her program, and her coach, Frank Carroll, went on to become Michelle Kwan's long-time coach.

Fratianne, who began skating at nine years old, won her first title at the World Figure Skating Championship in Tokyo in 1977 against the favorite to win, East Germany's Anett Pötzsch. The next year, she lost her title to Pötzsch, only to regain it in 1979. Fratianne went on to win her first Olympic medal at the 1980 Lake Placid Games, where she earned silver at the age of nineteen.

Let's move on from the Winter Olympics to the Summer Olympics, where more Italian and Italian Americans have set records and achieved Olympic gold.

Paola Pezzo was the first Olympic athlete ever to receive a gold medal in mountain biking. Pezzo won gold during the 1996 Summer Olympics in Atlanta, Georgia and the 2000 Games in Sydney in women's cross-country mountain bike. Pezzo also won the World Championship in Métabief, France in 1993 and in Chateau d'Oex, Switzerland in 1997 and the Gundig World Cup in 1997. Her mountain bike-racing career began in 1989 with Bianchi.

As tiny as she was, Mary Lou Retton was larger than life in becoming the world's number one gymnast. In the 1984 Olympics at Los Angeles, the American gymnast from Fairmount, WV came from behind to score perfect 10s on the vault and floor exercise to win the all-around title. At the same Olympics, she won four additional medals; a silver in the team all-round and the horse vault, and bronzes in the floor exercise and uneven bars. Retton was inducted into the National Italian American Sports Hall of Fame in 1992 and a street and park were named after her in her hometown in West Virginia (though she tells people that Texas is her home).

Matt Biondi, a Palo Alto, CA native, struck the Olympic jackpot in Seoul in 1988. While he was a member of the University of California-Berkeley's (where he was also a student) NCAA Champion Water Polo Squad, Biondi was well on his way to becoming one of the world's best swimmers.

In 1984's Olympics in Los Angeles, Biondi took home the gold in the men's 4x100m freestyle relay. He was just eighteen years old. Four years later, just before the Seoul Games, he set a world record in the 100-meter freestyle, completing it in 48.42 seconds. Biondi took five gold medals, one silver medal and a bronze medal home from the 1988 Olympics. In the '92 Olympics in Barcelona, Biondi earned two more gold medals and one silver medal to add to his collection. This brought his medal total to eleven, which tied him with shooter Carl Osburn and swimmer Mark Spitz for the most Olympic medals won by an American athlete. Biondi retired after the Barcelona Games in 1992 and was inducted into the National Italian American Sports Hall of Fame that same year.
And still, the best is yet to come.

In the lead-up to Torino's Olympics, Italian eyes are watching Giorgio Rocca, Italy's new Alberto Tomba hopeful. At press time, Rocca, who hails from Livigno (Sondrio, Lombardia), Italy, was undefeated in the first five World Cup races (there are ten races in all).

Rocca, who does not like being compared to Tomba, is more concerned with charity rather than making headlines. Last year, the reserved and disciplined alpine skier won two bronze medals at the World Championships. He then auctioned off his equipment to raise money for hospitals in Afghanistan.

Other Italian gold medal hopefuls for the Torino Games include cross-country skier and 2002 gold medalist, Gabriella Paruzzi; two-time Olympic medalist, Cristian "Zorro" Zorzi, also a cross-country skier; and Enrico Fabris, who leads the men's speed skating team and is Italy's hopeful for their first ever speed skating medal in Olympic history.

On all sides of the globe, Italians and Italian Americans have made history in the Olympics. However, the Games not only celebrate excellence in athletics, they provide a precious unity among countries all over the world.