Women's emancipation “travels” by bicycle

In 1896 one of the pioneers of the struggle for women's rights, the American Susan Brownell Anthony, claimed that cycling was the activity that more than any other was contributing to women's emancipation. The bike, in fact, allowed you to move freely and move independently in an era when it was considered scandalous for a woman to go around without being accompanied by a family male - father, brother and husband who was -, worse even if alone.

What today appears to us as habitual as an “all-female” ride was, therefore, a real achievement for women a little over a century ago. Indeed it was only the first step to combat a series of prejudices as told by "Women on a bicycle" (Ediciclo Editore, 2020, pp. 497), this year's winner of the Bancarella Sport Award.

In this interesting and well-documented essay, the journalist Antonella Stelitano traces the history of women's cycling in our country in great detail and data, a story that is also, as previously mentioned, a story of women's emancipation and the fight against prejudices. . Cycling, since the appearance of this revolutionary vehicle - think about it: the first "machine" designed to move in complete autonomy! - was considered an activity not at all feminine. Not only because it gave freedom to women, but also because it needed “sports” clothing considered indecent. In addition, for a long time it was believed that an effort such as cycling with bikes weighing over 20 kilos such as those of the early twentieth century harms women's health or even makes women sterile.

To change things were some pioneers who dedicated themselves to sports cycling such as the famous Alfonsina Strada who participated in the midst of a crowd of male colleagues in the 1924 Giro d'Italia reaching the finish line of the grueling competition. And even more did the many women who began to travel for work by bike or who risked their lives astride their two wheels as partisan relays.

As Antonella Stelitano recounts, the many post-war changes, including the fact that from 1946 women could vote and enter Parliament, did not immediately open the way to cycling as a sporting activity for women. 1962 had to arrive because finally races were organized in Italy and teams of cyclists were born. However, the problems were not overcome and many of the prejudices existing at the end of the nineteenth century continued to survive.

Emblematic is the story of Florinda Parenti, born in 1943 and daughter of an Italian who emigrated to Belgium for work. In her adopted country she had participated in cycling races from an early age and was contacted for this to be part of the tricolor team that was to participate in the 1962 World Cup. Florinda accepted with enthusiasm but first had to deal with a doctor who denied her the agonistic fitness claiming that riding a bicycle would no longer be able to have children. And then she had to face her employer who fired her on the spot after seeing her name in the order of arrival of a race in the Gazzetta dello Sport. Of course, then things changed and female cycling myths arrived like Maria Canins, Paola Pezzo and Antonella Bellutti who triumphed in the Tour de France, World Championships and Olympics. However, the history of Italian cycling reminds us that only a few decades ago a woman on a bicycle gave scandal, a sign that certain behaviors that today we condemn - rightly, God forbid - in countries like Afghanistan are not so far from us, at least from the point of view. of temporal view. Better remember that.