On Saturday, February 23 the Mascalzone Latino Sailing School has decided to take part en masse in the Naples Family Run & Friends, a non-competitive foot race a day before the Naples City Half Marathon. Leading the young and cheerful crew of more than 90 students and family members there will also be president and founder Vincenzo Onorato, involved for the first time in a non-sailing event with the kids of the Sailing School to underline participation in the educational experience of the kids.
The Family Run&Friends is only one of the chances that Napoli Running offers those who want to run in the open air during the three days dedicated to foot racing of the Naples City Half Marathon. It begins on Friday 22nd with the opening of the sport Expo at the Mostra d’Oltremare where 20,000 racers and followers are expected in the days of the event. On Saturday at 11 AM the non-competitive Family Run & Friends will thread through the avenues of the Exhibition. Sunday at 9 AM sees the start of the half marathon with 7500 entries from 40 different nationalities. The competitive aim is to complete it in under an hour. The social aim is to have a great day dedicated to well-being among the colours of the city.
This activity fits perfectly in the main objectives of the mission of the Mascalzone Latino Sailing School, which offers a training course with sailing instruction and seamanlike activities, in parallel with and complementing the school career, for kids of between six and 18 years of age from areas in situations of social difficulty. After many years of activity and the gradual attaining of adulthood by many of the early students, the Mascalzone Latino Sailing School has recently begun to offer other activities to complete its offer and guarantee not just the basics but real tools and opportunities for a concrete future in the world of work.
An example is the fact that, last January, three “veteran” students of the Mascalzone Latino Sailing School completed the training courses required for embarkation of the Italian Marine Academy Technologies of the Marina of Ischitella. At the prestige Neapolitan navigation Academy, our Claudio Napoletano, Roberto Lombardi and Matteo Tucci, two of three from the nautical Institute, had the chance to enrich their training with basic and advanced instruction on subjects including safety, fire prevention and rescue, both practical and theoretical, preparing the youngsters for their first work on board or for jobs in the port or shipping companies.
The instruction lasted a total of three weeks, spent with other young and not so young people, perhaps their future colleagues: in some cases they had as “companions” also commanders in service undergoing required training activities and compulsory professional improvement.
So these were professional training experiences that qualified them for maritime work. Basically it was a natural evolution of the career we hoped for for kids taking part in the Mascalzone Latino Sailing School, the natural follow-up to a training activity that often begins at a very young age, putting sport alongside study, initially as a game and later as a more serious competitive activity. An activity that in many cases also points them towards nautical training schools which, in the end, helps the kids to have a solid future, possibly and preferably in one of the many professions linked to the sea.
Now in its ninth year of activity in the Sailing Section of the Naples Marina Militare, the Mascalzone Latino Sailing School has so far provided free beginners’ sailing courses to more than 1100 students. In 2019 80s training 30 students in the pre-competitive and competitive teams on board Optimists, Lasers and 420s, offering a total of 30 hours of after-school training a week.
Vincenzo Onorato, president of Mascalzone Latino: «It’s really a great pleasure for me to be with the kids in this little adventure of the Family Run & Friends. It will be a great experience together to enjoy the beauties of our city of Naples on a special day and take the chance to make a project better known to the city. I have always said I was a man of the sea, with a boundless love of sailing. The sea must also be a great resource for young people in Naples. This is why I created the Sailing School, a safe harbour for the youth of so many kids at risk. We have been committed for years, not just to following them while they are at school but also to giving them a future: we try to cultivate future sailing champions and, in any case, give them all the chance to enter a profession that has to do with the sea.»
Antonietta De Falco, director of the Mascalzone Latino Sailing School: «We are happy to have our president alongside us on a day that will see students and their families involved in an event that includes the three main pillars of our organisation: family, friendship and sport. It will be wonderful to be present as the Mascalzone Latino Sailing School, since our project also aims at developing the kids also through physical activity, so for us it’s a joy to be able to have fun together and make our project known in such a direct way to our city: we will show that we are trying to educate citizens who won more aware, able to challenge their energies in a different perspective from the desolate one of the “quarters”, giving them instead a clear idea of the future and an important role in their beautiful Naples.»