History
Capri-Naples
In 1949 Aldo Fioravanti and Cesare Alfieri, two passionate swimmers, were the first ones to cover the distance from Naples to Capri island in around 12 hours, at an average of 30 strokes per minute.
Capri-Napoli is one of the more fascinating and difficult competition, until 1992 awarding long distance world title, now the crossing swimming race Capri-Napoli is a “FINA World Grand Prix” leg over a distance of 36 km as the crow file distance.
The Gulf of Naples has always been the suggestive “playing field” of this contest starting normally from Marina Grande ( Capri ) and finishing to the sea-front of Via Caracciolo ( Naples ) assigning the World title until 1992.
For the winners the race lasts about 6 hours and 30 minutes and 7 hours, according to sea and weather conditions.
The fascination of the sea marathons, much more tiring than the earth ones, just lies in the incredible effort going on for several hours in unnatural conditions.
On 2006 the open water swimming became an Olympic discipline thanks to a IOC decision and a 10 km race ( male and famale ) has taken place during the Olympic Games of Beijing 2008 for the first time.
Considering the goal reached, the “FINA World Cup” calendar is now made by 2 different circuits:
- “FINA WORLD GRAND PRIX”, which includes the competitions 15 km and over 15 km. This circuit is the one including all the traditional long races.
- “FINA WORLD CUP” which includes only the 10 Km competitions.
The 2013 “FINA World Series”calendar consists of 16 events: 8 races part of the “FINA WORLD GRAND PRIX” and 8 races part of the “FINA WORLD CUP”.
Therefore the “Maratona del Golfo Capri-Napoli” is an official leg of 2013 FINA WORLD GRAND PRIX and it will take place on 1st of September and it will be the last race of the season awarding the Grand Prix title.
The event is promoted by “Eventualmente – Eventi e Comunicazione” .
The 2013 edition of the race from Capri to Naples will be the 48th one in 60 years of this famous crossing swimming race, the 11th one of the recent past ( from 2003, after a break of 11 years ).
Before the long break of 1992 there have been 37 editions in 39 years: the first one dates back to August the 2nd on 1954 and the last one to July the 5th on 1992 ( It was not played on 1984 and on 1985 ).
This event had for many years the President of Italian Republic’s high sponsorship. It has always been organized and promoted by the newspaper “Il Mattino“, above all thanks to the passion and the commitment of the journalists Alberto Barone and Lello Barbuto, promoters of the race.
Each edition has always had the sponsorship of the Local Government Institutions and of the Italian Navy.
For many years the swimming marathon Capri-Napoli has been part of a bigger event dating back to the “50s’” called “La Settimana Motonautica” , which used to be an initiative dedicated not just to the swimming marathon, but also to the offshore, the saling and to the water sky contests, looking like a bit water sports festival.
This event is surely one of the most celebrated and known in its field. After years of more and more spectacular and fascinating sea challenges, the event has enlarged its horizons and has gone beyond the Italian borders, becoming famous and well-known all over the world.
Just for this reason the Long Distance Swimming International Federation chase the famous race as unique trial to award of the long distance world champion (male and female ) title, keeping such praxis up till the “80′s”.
Then on 1991 FINA included the Open Water Swimming discipline among its ones. Therefore since that year the world championship title is awarded by:
- World Cup: the competition consists of different legs in the five continents;
- World Championships: the competition consists of 3 specific distance challenges ( 5 km, 10 km and 25 km ) taking place in the same venue for a 1 week last.
On 1993/94 FINA promoted the first “World Cup” which included 8 legs with distances from 26 Km ( Brazil: Tapes ) to the 88 km ( Argentina: Hernandarias-Paranà ).
On 1991 FINA included the open water swimming discipline in the Swimming World Championships with a race over a distance of 25 km only. Then on 1998 FINA added to that one the 5 Km race. At the end of 2000 FINA added the 10 km race as well. This race is the one added in the Olympic Program on 2006 by I.O.C. and it took place for the first time in Beijing 2008.
The success of this event is clear looking at in its numbers ( updated on 2012 ):
528 swimmers ( 404 men and 124 women ), with 1.225 swimmers at the start in 47 past events belonging to 53 nations and 5 continents.
The ones who know the event surely remember the so-called “Nile’s crocodiles” the famous Egyptian athletes who “invented” this kind of contest and first left their mark on the event achieving the first win ( Marey Hassan ). They grabbed the female wins record ( 9 ). The Egyptians were always clashed by the “Argentinian Caymans”, holding the male wins record ( 10 ) and the singles presence record, which belongs to Claudio Plit, 15 times at the start ( 13 + 2 recent past editions ).
An Italian swimmer, the Neapolitan Giulio Travaglio, holds the singles win record, in fact he arrived at the first place for 5 times, well representing the long Italian tradition concerning this discipline.
Finally, an Australian athlete set the time record: Trent Grimsey holds the record ( 6h 29′ 02″ ) set in 2012. Among the women the time record belongs to the german Angela Maurer ( 7h 00′ 08″ ) set in the first new edition on 2003.
Social Network
