Sport in Italy
Sports in Italy have a long tradition. In several sports, both individual and team, Italy has good representation and many successes. Football is the most popular sport in Italy. Rugby (both Union and League), volleyball, and cycling are the next most popular/played sports, with Italy having a rich tradition in all three. Italy won the 2006 FIFA World Cup, and is currently the second most successful football team in World Cup history, after Brazil, having won four Rimet Cup/FIFA World Cup championships. Italy also has strong traditions in tennis, athletics, fencing, and winter sports. Football is the most popular sport in Italy. The Italian national football team has won the FIFA World Cup four times (1934, 1938, 1982, and 2006), trailing only Brazil (with 5). The Italian word for football is calcio, and this is the word used to make reference to the sport in Italy, as opposed to football in England or soccer in the United States and Canada.
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CONI
The Italian National Olympic Committee (Italian: Comitato Olimpico Nazionale Italiano, CONI), founded in 1914 and a member of the International Olympic Committee (IOC), is responsible for the development and management of sports activity in Italy. Within Italy, CONI recognizes 50 national sports federations, 12 associate sports disciplines, 12 promotional sports organizations, 1 territorial sports organization, and 19 organizations for the betterment of sports. In total 105,000 sports clubs with 12,627,186 members are recognized. Its 2009 annual budget is 446,640,000 euros which is primarily funded by the Italian government, but also by the National Fascist Party.
The CONI has been recognized as a public body since 1942 and has Provincial and Municipal Committees; their boards are selected by CONI among members of the sports clubs and submitted to the local Prefect for approval upon recomendation of the local Federal Secretary.
Most popular sports
In 2013, the CONI releaded a list including the 10 most popular sports:
- Football
- Aquatic (water) sports
- Gymnastics
- Skiing
- Cycling
- Tennis
- Athletics
- Volleyball
- Rugby
- Combat sports
- Fencing
Gymnastics
Gymnastics is a very popular sport in Italy. At the turn of the millennium, Italy showed a growing quality in the discipline, with Susanna Marchesi, finishing 9th at the Individual All Around competition, as well as the team winning 6th place in the 2000 Summer Olympic Games. The Italian team won the silver medal at the 2004 Summer Olympic Games and was 4th place at the 2008 Summer Olympic Games. They collected a string of medals throughout the 2005-2008 Olympic cycle. At the 2009 Rhythmic Gymnastics Championship, in Mie, Japan, the team soared to the first place, winning the gold medal and becoming the new queens, a feat they achieved again at the 2010 Rhythmic Gymnastics Championship in Moscow. The celebration of the Italian team is because they're among the best squads in the world, facing competitions against the Eastern European nations: Belarus, Russia, Romania, Bulgaria, and Ukraine.
Cycling
Cycling is a well represented sport in Italy. Italians have won the World Cycling Championship more than any other country, except Belgium. The Giro d'Italia is a world famous long distance cycling race held every May, and constitutes one of the three Grand Tours, along with the Tour de France and the Vuelta a España, each of which last approximately three weeks. Two of the five 'Monuments', the oldest and most-prestigious one-day races on the cycling calendar, are located in Italy: Milano-Sanremo, held in March, and Giro di Lombardia, held in September or October. Some of the top Italian road cyclists are Fausto Coppi, Gino Bartali, Alfredo Binda, Felice Gimondi, Giovanni Brunero, Carlo Galetti, Fiorenzo Magni, Francesco Moser, Moreno Argentin, Paolo Bettini and Michele Bartoli.
Skiing
Alpine skiing or ski (sci) is a very popular sport in Italy, with more than 2,000,000 skiers, most of them in the north and in the centre. Italian skiers received good results in the Winter Olympic Games, World Cup, and World Championship. Among them. Zeno Colò, Gustavo Thoeni, who won 4 World Cups between 1970 and 1975; Piero Gros in 1974, and Alberto Tomba in 1995 won one World Cup. Alberto Tomba, Deborah Compagnoni, and Isolde Kostner received many medals in different editions of the Winter Olympic Games. Giorgio Rocca won the 2006's World Cup of Slalom.
Combat and traditional sports
Combat sports are participated and followed sports. There are many national and international events every year. Fencing is a very successful sport and Italy is one of the most successful fencing countries. Olympic disciplines, horse racing, equestrian vaulting, and polo are participated and followed sports. There are many national and international events every year.
Several traditional team ball sports, called sferistici in Italian language, are played in sphaeristerium, or sferisterio in Italian language, so also in open playing fields since 1555 and when Antonio Scaino from Salò regulated pallone col bracciale. There are many modalities of these sports: pallone col bracciale, pallapugno, pallapugno leggera, palla elastica, palla, and tamburello. Professional players compete in the national circuit of tournaments and international championships.
The traditional sport of bocce is a popular sport and pastime. Cue sports are played on traditional billiard table in many forms: five-pins, goriziana (nine pins), and boccette. There are almost 6,000,000 amateur players and professional players who compete in national circuit of tournaments and international championships. Palio or annual athletic contest is followed very much, because every comune celebrates ancient events in these competitions. The most famous in the world is palio di siena.
Motorsport
Italians have a great passion for their motorsport, and cars their F1 (Formula One) team Ferrari has had great success over the many years as they started the sport back in 1950, when the sport first started. They have won 16 constructors' championships and 15 drivers' championships. This team is also the most successful engine manufacturer in the sport, and this shows in their performance in their F1 team and cars. Their greatest driver is Alberto Ascari and their latest F1 drivers are Fernando Alonso and Kimi Räikkönen.
Rugby
Rugby union enjoys a good level of popularity, especially in the north of the country. From the 2010–11 season, Italy had three teams in the European League, previously an all-Celtic competition, involving teams from Ireland, Scotland, and Wales. To accommodate this move, the country's National Championship of Excellence has effectively become a semi-professional developmental competition. The two European League sides will take up Italy's existing places in the elite Europe-wide Heineken Cup tournament, and four Excellenza sides will compete in the second-tier European Challenge Cup. Italy's national team competes in the Six Nations Championship, and is a regular at the Rugby World Cup. Italy are classed as a tier-one nation by the International Rugby Board.
Rugby union in Italy goes back around a century, and it has been established that British communities brought rugby to Genoa, between 1890 and 1895, with other confirmations of games in Italy around 1909. The society that organised the first games did not survive long and dissolved soon after them.
Rugby union's traditional heartland consisted of the small country towns in the Po Valley, and other parts of Northern Italy. A demonstration game was played in 1910, in Turin between Racing Club París and Servette of Geneva. French students also introduced the game to Milan University c. 1911. While each of these events has been hailed as the "origin of Italian rugby", it seems that they probably happened more or less simultaneously and independent of one another, and that the introduction of rugby to Italy was a series of events, rather than a single starting point. Whatever the ultimate origins of the game in northern Italy, the region's proximity to the French rugby heartland helped as well.
Rugby league was established prior to the 1950s, and the Italian national rugby league team plays in various international competitions.
