Rome’s Olympic Stadium, with its sweeping 70,000 cobalt blue seats, provides a fitting backdrop to watch athletic excellence and history in the making. The venue has served as the stage for some of the most iconic moments in sports, from the 1960 Summer Olympics to the 1990 FIFA World Cup final. Today, it also hosts the annual Golden Gala Pietro Mennea, a stop on the Wanda Diamond League circuit, the premier international track and field series that is regarded as the sport’s equivalent of Formula 1. 

On Thursday evening, June 4, more than 40 Olympic and world champions gathered here to show that at this level, precision is everything. Winning can come down to margins invisible to the naked eye, and so it went throughout the night in the Italian capital, where every competitor lived in tenths and hundredths.