Valentina Vezzali was only six years old , but she was already different from the other litter fencers. The trainer would ask the young fencers to practise offensive and defensive actions, ten times per group , but Valentina would not shop at that and always practiced more . When the trainer would ask them to accelerate while running, she always ran faster and longer than the other children. Her sister Nathalie, who was worried she would hurt herself or become too exhausted said to her ,"You are still very young, you shouldn't impose this on your body or else you will end up hurting yourself ." But to this Valentina replied ,"Don't worry! I don't feel tired and training gives me such joy."
At the time , Nathalie and two other fencers of the club had alread formed the Jesi fencing team and won the gold medal in the junior national competition . One of the fencers, Giovanna Trillini , became an Olympic gold medallist in 1992 in Barcelona . Giovanna and Nathalie were Valentina's idols. During training, she often asked to fence with Giovanna.Valentina was too young to be a rival and she had not enough training ,and would eng up feeling like a sieve. Valentina talked about this experience when she was already champion ,"I was no match to Trillini at the time and was always hit before I had time to react.My spirits were however never dampened , on the contrary, it fuelled my determination . And I made a promise to myself that I would win it all back in the future ".Later, Vezzali fulfilled the promise she had made to herself in the Fencing World Championships and Olympic Games.