TURIN, Italy — “When I turn 90, I’ll change my routine. Maybe.”

For now, at 82, Giovanni Potenza is still climbing — higher and faster, reaching for the rooftops of the world. Literally.

A champion of vertical running, Potenza has made a name for himself in the extreme sport, which involves racing up the stairwells of skyscrapers and other towering urban landmarks. He has taken on London’s Broadgate Tower, Dubai’s Jumeirah Emirates Towers and New York’s One World Trade Center.

Wearing a bandanna and a T-shirt bearing his name, birth year — 1944 — and social media profile, Potenza took on another challenge Sunday in his hometown of Turin. The occasion carried special meaning. “Here, I have friends and family who know me, and the excitement is so intense that I have trouble sleeping,” he said before tackling the Piedmont regional government tower five times.

The challenge: 41 floors and a reported total of 5,500 steps. His time: 53 minutes and 20 seconds, 40 seconds faster than in the previous edition. He also drew attention from the elite athletes competing in the event, which is part of the Italian SkyRunning Federation’s calendar.

Every building is a personal challenge, every summit a goal. But reaching the top is not enough. You have to want to start all over again. Repeating the effort is part of the sport.

“When I look at a skyscraper, I think: Tomorrow, you’re going to have to deal with me.”

Originally from Puglia, in southern Italy, Potenza moved to Turin at 15, eager to play soccer and determined to build a future for himself. His life has been shaped by hard work and entrepreneurship. He worked in the automotive industry as a body-shop owner and ran a car dealership that opened in 1966 that is now managed by his children. For the past 35 years, he has also helped run a hotel on the outskirts of Turin.

Sport has been a constant throughout his life. He played soccer as a boy, took up skiing and later tried tennis — “but I got bored” — before discovering the adrenaline rush of vertical running in 2018, at age 74.

His first training ground was the hotel itself. With eight floors, it offered the perfect place to prepare. He climbed its stairs 20 times a day, tackling more than 3,000 steps in total. He kept up the increasingly demanding routine for five years before making his debut in London.

“I hadn’t told anyone. I didn’t know how it would go.”

It went very well. From there, his ambitions — and the number of floors he climbed — kept growing: 70, then 105, then 140.

“In Warsaw, I climbed 200 floors, rested, and then did another 200 the next morning. And over 24 hours, I reached 600 floors, with a total climbing time of 165 minutes.”

The feat speaks to his endurance and ability to manage physical strain. It also reinforces a conviction he has carried throughout his athletic career: “Passion, combined with consistency, discipline and a good diet, can take you much further than you imagine.”

His training includes running on sand, along the water’s edge and on asphalt. He also hikes in the mountains carrying a backpack and wearing heavy boots to make the effort more demanding.

“At Sestriere, at an altitude of 2,500 meters, I even challenge myself by wearing half-kilogram ankle weights. What would seem crazy to many people is fun for me. I never get tired of it.”

Even daily life becomes an opportunity to train. Potenza lives on the 10th floor of his building and has devised a practical solution for bringing home groceries.

“I put the bags in the elevator and wait for it upstairs. That way, I arrive with my arms free.”

His family supports him wholeheartedly. His children hug him before competitions and are his biggest fans, even if they prefer to keep their feet on the ground.

There is one thing he finds harder to endure than an almost impossible climb: long lines. “I can’t wait to get away,” he says.

His gaze is always turned upward. Whenever he visits a new city, he tells himself he should relax and enjoy the trip. Inevitably, though, he finds himself looking up at the tallest skyscraper.

Each competition brings another milestone. In 2019, he took on the Dubai Holding SkyRun at the Jumeirah Emirates Towers, a futuristic complex where the course covers 52 floors and 1,334 steps, spanning a height of 265 meters.

“There were 500 of us, and many competitors were younger than me. But I set a new record for the race and a world record by completing the course three times in a row — 156 floors in all, averaging 13 minutes per climb.”

He credits his fitness partly to the fact that he has “never smoked a cigarette in my life” and partly to a generous dose of what he calls “Puglian stubbornness.”

He has no intention of discovering his limits anytime soon. The question skeptics ask him most often is predictable: Why put yourself through all this? Why not take the elevator like everyone else?

His answer is a mantra: “I’m just getting started. My goal isn’t to reach the top. It’s to keep doing this for as long as my body and my passion allow me.”

Perhaps, he says, he will rethink his plans when he turns 90.

His philosophy is a metaphor for life itself: enjoy the journey, not just the destination. Hic et nunc — here and now. He stays focused on the present without losing sight of the horizon.

“I already have my next goal. It’s right there in front of me, setting the pace for my training: 250 floors in one hour.”

One step at a time.

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