Miracle bracelets, yes, but just for the vendor's counter

At long last, the Italian Antitrust just fined the Italian distributors of the "Power Balance" bracelets.

From an Australian idea they sold thousand of pieces, promising a wide range of benefic effects, from the balance to the strenght, from the resistance to the mental and physical well-being insomuch as to convince famous sportsmen and lots of people worldwide.

In Italy, these magic bracelets had been a big success, despite their expensive cost (from 20 to 50 Euros), just for a thin strip of neoprene and silicone.

But a research from the Italian Health Institute (ISS) declared  what who  study sports and movement sciences already knew, that there was  anything scientific at all behind these bracelets. As consequence, these companies are sanctioned by 350 thousand Euros for misleading advertising.

I can understand the hunger for an improvement of  ourselves, but nobody should search for better physical performances in something external  (except nutrition obviously), such as pharmaceutical substances or miraculous new equipment.

The periodic table of doping

The famous Periodic Table of Elements invented by the Russian chemist Mendeleev has just been changed by the IUPAC (International Union of Pure and Applied Chemistry).

They discovered that the atomic weights of ten chemical elements were not a constant and a fixed number, but a value out of an interval.

That's interesting not just for chemistry itself, but also in the world of sport. Why? Because it is important, in sports doping investigation, to distinguish human testosterone from the pharmaceutical one. The atomic weight of carbon into the latter is lower, so, the precision of the analysis could be crucial in the eternal fight between sport and these consequences of a champion-based model.

Goodbye Enzo Bearzot, honest reserved winner

Enzo Bearzot was not only the coach of Italian team during the 1982 World Cup in Spain, finished (as everybody knows) with an unexpected triumph of the Azzurri, but - more than this - he was a reserved and honest man, who preferred to stay away from the lights of success and to lead a simple life.

In Italy, of course, football is more than a religion and football actors are worshipped, rich and loved, but Enzo Bearzot decided to leave all this fame and attention just to his players.

He was called "Vecio" (old man in the dialect of his region; the Friuli Venezia-Giulia just like Fabio Capello) because of his appearance, even when he wasn't old at all.

Anyway he was an old-times gentleman that Italian sport, and football in particular, need today more than ever.

No more marathon, "Niggers" always winning!

Image: www.gianfalco.it

It first happened to the führer, during the 1936 Nazi Olympic Games in Berlin, to see the triumph of a “coloured”, James “Jesse” Cleveland Owens. Actually, neither Hitler had to complain that day, but something different is happening right now in Italy.
Next April 2011 – just like every year – will take place in Padova the traditional marathon of Sant’Antonio (patron of the city) and, during the meetings for the event’s organization, a Lega Nord party council member asked to stop public financing to the marathon saying that it’s a competition just for Africans and non-EC immigrants in underpants!
North-East Italy is a stronghold for this conservative, Sinn Féin-like party, so there is not to be completely astonished by similar politician’s statements. The real good news consist in all the negative feedback received by this indecent purpose from all around Italy (North-East included!).