Over 2.300 athletes will run through the streets of Rome on Sunday 21 February participating in the CISM Day Run. The foot race, now in its tenth edition and included in the official calendar of the FIDAL - Italian Federation of Athletics, is organized by the CISM, the International Council of Military Sports and is open to all military, agonists and not, belonging or not to the Military Sports Groups.
Inspired by the motto "Sport for all", the 2016 edition of the CISM Day Run is part of the XMILIA (DECAMILIA), a running event born in the 2004 thanks to the idea of Colonel Giangiacomo Calligaris, who died tragically in an accident in the 2014, but whose enthusiasm and sporting spirit are easy to find in runners and sports fans.
The XMILIA gives a new imprint to road races, recalling the extent of the Roman mile with which the distance is measured: the length of the route is in fact equal to 14.800 meters, corresponding to ten Roman miles. Today the competition, which will have a TDS (Timing Data Service) timing, has assumed a high level of competition, with thousands of participants, civil and military.
At the press conference to present the event, the organizers and some prominent athletes of the Italian Army stressed the importance of sport in life (#SportIsLife); in particular, Colonel Gaetano Pennacchio - Chief of the Sport Office of the Defense General Staff and Head of the CISM Italy delegation - recalled that the 18 February of 68 years ago gave birth to the International Military Sports Council.
Born in the 1948 in Nice on the initiative of five countries - Belgium, Denmark, France, Luxembourg and the Netherlands - the CISM is currently the only international multisport military organization, to which 134 Countries adhere and in which we recognize about 40 million people, of the Europe, the Americas, Africa and Asia. The motto that was chosen "Friendship through sport"(Friendship through sport) explains its purpose: to give the Armed Forces, through sport, an exclusively competitive rivalry.
(Photo: SMD)
