sport to win the dark
The project was unveiled at the CIP press conference by the President of the Italian Fencing Federation, Paolo Azzi, by the medical director of the Careggi Hospital Spinal Unit, Davide Casavola, by Ferrero’s Sponsorship Manager, Massimo Castiglia, by Piero Amati who presides over the Spinal Unit of Florence sports group, operationally involved with patients, and by the fencer of the Italian Paralympic national team Rossana Pasquino, who also represented her colleague and promoter Matteo Betti. Also present was a delegation of athletes from the Paralympic blue fencing team, a few days after the conclusion of the brilliant expedition of the European Championships in Warsaw in which Italy won 15 medals, establishing itself as the country that has climbed the podium more times than any other continental.
Sincere words of appreciation for the project were sent to Federal President Paolo Azzi by the Minister for Sport and Youth, Andrea Abodi.
“Back to White” is launched in a special sporting season for Italian fencing, which in 2023 will host the World Championship in July in Milan and the Paralympic World Championship in October in Terni, a significant coincidence in the wake of the total integration of the two specialties which in FIS specialties coexist in a single, consolidated and now essential reality.
“We have tried to be present and bring the fencing proposal into the spinal units and with this project we have succeeded thanks to the support of Ferrero, the Spinal Unit of Florence and thanks to the commitment and enthusiasm of Matteo Betti – explained the President of the FIS Paolo Azzi – We plan to replicate this project in other contexts and in other spinal units because making the offer of our sport known is one of our goals and desires. We are in a context in which we are talking about returning to the light: proposing sport in a difficult phase is extremely important and allows us to bring even very young kids closer. The FIS was among the first to integrate the Olympic and Paralympic sectors, something that today is normal and acquired and last season we lived the experiences of integrated training. We are already in the qualifying phase for Paris 2024, today the enrollment of Paralympic athletes in sports groups is a real fact and this is one more reason to propose fencing and to intensify promotion efforts. We want to entice many to try their hand at fencing and become part of the wonderful group that gave us the emotions of the last European Championships in Warsaw. I assure you of our commitment to continue on this path with the help of those who support us”.
Among the main partners of the event is the Ferrero company, represented by the Sponsorship Manager Massimo Castiglia. “For over a decade the FIS has been calling us to challenges and we respond, they have stimulated us and we have never stopped at the classic sponsorship formats. The Fencing Federation had the vision to focus on the concept of inclusion in unsuspecting times and it is in the DNA of our company to move as a social object, not just as a company”.
The medical director of the Careggi Spinal Unit, Davide Casavola, explained the first results of the initiative. “The results are positive and are having a very good impact. Our center is aimed at those who have recently had a spinal cord injury and who, therefore, have changed their life. Sport is an activity that helps restore participation and we are there to give them as much autonomy as possible. Top level athletes are a very important stimulus for patients and we hope to churn out some more champions soon”.
Piero Amati, who presides over the Spinal Unit of Florence sports group, told of the participation of patients. “The sports proposal we make is placed in a playful and aggregation form. Marco Betti is our link with the Federation, but many figures collaborate on this project: athletes who act as testimonials, doctors, an entire team that supports them. Every Thursday there is an hour-and-a-half appointment that is increasingly eagerly awaited. The Sports Group has always had the philosophy of connecting the territory and the hospital: working and creating projects together means creating the opportunity for patients to have the right contact to develop sporting activity through the clubs scattered throughout the area. Since September several people have already joined. Those who play sports acquire skills which then become important in their daily lives and, moreover, the important thing is to be together. The value of sport is also to give moments of carefree life”.
Tomorrow the blue Rossana Pasquino will begin this journey within Black to White bringing her testimony. “I’m excited – he said – because I have already been to a spinal center when I was nine years old and I would have liked to have met this sport much earlier. I am part of the Federal Council of the Italian Fencing Federation and we have set up a Paralympic promotion commission to try to increase the number of members by going to centers where the disabled are. I’ve been fencing for 10 years and this sport has given me emotions, but also a body I didn’t know I had. I regained my muscles and it was a rehabilitation for me that didn’t just involve competitions and medals”.
THE TITLE AND THE “BACK TO WHITE” CHALLENGE
The assertion according to which patients live with a vision of discouragement and pessimism about their own future is widespread and “common” among Spinal Unit and rehabilitation center professionals. The lower the age range, the more frequent, sometimes inevitable, “seeing everything black”, feeling enveloped in darkness. For this reason this project refers to “Back to White”. White as a color that represents freedom, peace, purification and the possibility of a new beginning. White is light, purity, mental clarity. And white is at the same time the color of the fencing uniform, a sporting discipline that can restore the “will to live”, enthusiasm and motivation to young boys, men and women who find themselves struggling in a complex situation, in which sport it can be a formidable “weapon”. Right through epee, foil and saber.
THE VALUE OF PARALYMPIC FENCING
A non-secondary aspect of the path of a potential Paralympic athlete, in addition to the psychological “recovery”, is also the recovery of physicality and many functions of one’s body. Thanks to fencing and the vast range of movements that training offers, it is possible to acquire skills that will make it easier to carry out the “small gestures” of daily life. FIS is the bearer of this message by vocation and historical commitment: for over a decade, in fact, the Italian Fencing Federation has embarked on a long journey with a pioneering spirit aimed at 100% integration of Olympic and Paralympic fencing. Today, Federscherma is an example of authentic integration, a sport where no one is excluded, which gives every athlete who shoots “standing up” or in a wheelchair (without forgetting the development of fencing for the blind) equal dignity and opportunities. One of the recent and most significant stages of this long journey took place with the start of integrated collegiate training between the Olympic and Paralympic national teams. There are about 90 Italian fencing companies that also practice the Paralympic activity, in a single room where wheelchair and Olympic fencing coexist and interact without distinction.
THE CAREGGI SPINAL UNIT PROJECT
One of the most ambitious objectives of the Italian Fencing Federation and at the same time of the “Back to White” project is to start involving young (and very young) children with disabilities by letting them try fencing and giving them the opportunity to embark on the path of competition. A cultural challenge, also to encourage families not to perceive their children’s disability with compliance. Paralympic sport is an exceptional example of how, even in the face of great difficulties, it is possible to overcome the dark and “return to white”. Starting from the opportunity to collaborate with the Spinal Unit of the Careggi Hospital in Florence, from September 2022, on a weekly basis, with constancy and application, patients of various age groups in Tuscany have begun to learn about fencing within the structure, thanks to federal technicians, physiotherapists, doctors, physical trainers, members of the staff of the Paralympic blue national team, athletes and champions as testimonials and “sparring”. An extremely positive impact, as well as exciting. The dream, or rather the goal, is to create a model that can be replicated in other cities, through the activation of the clubs present in the various Italian territories. To continue, more and more, to make fencing, the sport of the icon Bebe Vio and of the “unique” Federation for Olympic and Paralympic athletes, the discipline of integration par excellence.