Donna Moderna, the magazine edited by Annalisa Monfreda, presents a project called Atlete: stories of female sports professionals who – despite many sporting successes – are relegated by Italian regulations to amateur roles with a marginal image, also among the general public. From winter to team sports, and from swimming to disciplines generally considered more male, such as football, car racing and boxing, their stories stand out for their strength and determination and a capacity to enter the collective imagination and bring honour and acclaim to the country.

“In the great chorus with which in 2018 we are giving voice to “Donne come noi” (Women Like Us), which looks at women who are making headway gaining space in society, we felt that athletes deserved a special mention,” explained Annalisa Monfreda, editor of Donna Moderna. “They are the pioneers of female empowerment, as they continuously challenge the limits of their bodies and the society in which they live. And yet, despite this, they still face disparity with the other half of the sky, a disparity that is even written into the rules!”

Atlete (www.donnamoderna.com/atlete/) is an online long-form response in 25 chapters, that will be published weekly, each of which – with video, photos and text – will tell the story of an outstanding sportswoman or group of sportswomen – that are representative of a universe, a specificity or a particular battle. Some examples: Eleonora Piacezzi, 23, is one of the brightest hopes of Italian women’s football. She plays for the national team and the Cuneo women’s team but she is still obliged to work part-time in her family’s greenhouse business in Liguria, and to train twice a week on her own and another twice a week in the evenings, after driving many kilometres by car to join her team-mates. Or Nataliya Shudruk and her team-mates of the Lobsters Pescara (a female American football team, a sport that in Italy has fewer then 100 participants) who in order to find the resources they need to participate in the championship had to organise a crowdfunding initiative and a self-produced calendar.

Atlete is also a series of 6 reportage article, published once a month in print, with outstanding photographs by Ugo Zamborlini and written by Gianluca Ferraris and Barbara Rachetti. And, from 15 June, an 8-part podcast, produced by Piano P, each of which telling a story in the voices of journalists, the protagonist and background sounds, along with audio extracts from the competitions.

The story continues also on social channels, using the hashtag #Atlete to share the project with the entire community of the Donna Moderna brand: the video interviews of Atlete will be available on YouTube and posted natively on Facebook and Instagram.