The mother of Italian synchronized swimming is Romilde “Rumy” Cucchetti. Without her the movement of synchro should have evolved with some lustrum late. All began in the 70’s, exactly in 1972, when Romilde – in those years swimming teacher at the Lanciani swimming pool in Rome – decided to make her little athletes swim an alternate backstroke, pulsing the movements. This kept the focus of her students high and produced a so pleasant and fascinating effect that the experiment became a nice entertainment for the audience during the race intervals. “The truth is another. I always liked – “Rumy” said – long-lasting awards ceremonies and I couldn’t stand that they stopped at the first three: those intermissions were needed to give a medal to all the children of swimming school”. These “breaks” became inevitable and Cucchetti decided to make them more and more difficult: for example, making her young athletes swim with different rhythms, then in different dispositions, then with a flower kept out of water and given to their parents at the end of the exercise. Rumy had done; the great fan of Ester Williams, who she met in 1981 in Catania during an Italian Championship, gave birth to the synchronized swimming in Italy. The following years weren’t simple. All was on the shoulders of Rumy, who continued to teach swimming at the sport club De Gregorio and to promote new ideas for the choreographies at the swimming pool of “Roma 70”. “We did have nothing: the bathrobes were sewn by my mother – she remembers – and we used a simple tape player, that I still conserve, to play the music”. The federal recognition to the new movement was still far, but it became real in 1976. A year before the first team of synchronized swimming was introduced: the so-called “telline” of Cucchetti were seven little girls and one little boy; the “tellino” was Riccardo Vincioni. Patrizia Concordia was among these eight little athletes. She was Italian champion in single, duet and team races several times. “A long wandering across Italy began – Rumy remembers – We performed everywhere to promote this little movement. From Cortina to Liguria, from Emilia-Romagna to Sicily”. All waiting the approval of Federnuoto. “The most perceptive spokesman at those days – Cucchetti continues - was Cosimo Impronta, the president of the Regional Latium Committee”. Around the swimming pools, in particular in Rome, athletes and teachers of swimming began to study and teach synchro. Among them Cristina Ferrucci who became the first Italian champion in 1977, preceding Stefania Tudini – today the President of Technical Committee of the Federation Internationale de Natation – Bruna Rossi – diving champion and today sport psychologist for the Settebello Team, World champion in 2011 and vice-Olympic champion in 2012 – and Annalisa Leo. They all were involved by Rumy as athletes, organizers and press agents. The heart of synchronized swimming was the swimming pool of “Roma 70” sport club where the athletes of De Gregorio trained. “The group was formed by ten girls, that were friends but there was also a right competition among them”, Cucchetti tells. She trained her athletes twice a day: before school and in the afternoon after lunch. She often drove the sincronette to the swimming pool: “I was able to pile ten of them in the car”, she remembers smiling. In 1976 the Italian Federation approved the movement and Romilde became the first federal trainer, while the internal organization and the administration management were entrusted to Marisa Fabbri. The logical consequence was the First Italian Championship occurred in Rome in 1977: in single race Cristina Ferrucci, and in the duet Bruna Rossi and Anna Cornelli, and in the team competition De Gregorio won. During the same year, the 28th April in Bolzano, the Italian team made its debut during the meeting with Austria that won, but for the Rumy’s girls the International debut was an incredible invitation to climb the Continental and World hierarchies. The Italian synchronized swimming was growing in exponential way. The following aim was the participation of Italy in World Championship in Berlin in 1978: the convocation was very difficult. “I remember that we received the news while we were in Riccione for a performance: we didn’t hope it anymore – the ex technical coach says – The final deadline was at midnight of that day. Just at the end of the performance a telegram arrived from Fin. I took the microphone and announced to my girls that we had to go to Berlin: it was the reward to several battles and sacrifices”. The results were obviously not so shiny but in synchronized swimming the technical performance may be improved and made perfect only comparing it with other athletes during the races. In few years the Italy of synchro improved its position and in 1981, at the European Championships in Spalato, Susanna De Angelis ranked eighth in the single race; the duet formed by Mara Pastore and Lorena Zenobi ranked seventh and the team ranked fifth. Behind them the talent of Antonella Terenzi, defined “The strongest Azzurra of all times” by Cucchetti, was rising. The following year Romilde guided the team that participated in the World Championships in Guayaquil ranking eleventh at team competition. For Romilde Cucchetti this was the last event as Technical Coach of Italy of synchro. In 1983 she was promoted as Technical Coordinator of National teams. Her role was given to the Canadian ex athlete Jennifer Teackle who was substituted, in 1984, with the American Margaret “Margo” Erickson who guided the National Team of synchro at the Olympic Games in Los Angeles. “They alerted me – Romilde says – but Fin decided to call Erickson”. Cucchetti held the task as coordinator until 1986, keeping the role of ambassador of the Italian synchronized swimming, helping the constitution of one hundred seventy associations and several master teams, showing to drive the times. In 2004 for the first time in Italy, she made the mixed duet, composed by Raffaella Casadei and Antonio Pierini, to perform at the swimming pool in Mentanta. Maybe to tell about the strength and energy of this woman who dedicated all her life to “her” sport, we should listen the words of Susanna De Angelis who was an athlete of Cucchetti since 1976 to 1983, winning with her almost all her championships: “Rumy is the strongest, most steadfast and most determined woman I have ever met. She put her athletes above all. She was an inflexible trainer and required diligence and an irreprehensible behaviour. She showed that the synchro was a serious sport and not an “aquatic ballet”. Romilde taught us that hard work is worthwhile, nothing is more satisfying than a result obtained with difficulty and sacrifice and that only few things in life could give us adrenalin rush as the synchronized swimming race”. Since then Italy improved thanks to the planning and the work of Technical Trainers of the National Team: Cathy O'Brien, Stefania Tudini, Laura De Renzis and Patrizia Giallombardo. The Italian synchronized swimming is among the reference movements at European level with 23 medals won in continental exhibitions. In 2009 Beatrice Adelizzi won the first podium with the bronze medal in the free single routine. The Azzurre ranked third in the team competition winning the first historical medal at the European Championships in Athens in 1991. Giovanna Burlando is the Italian athlete with more medals having been on European podium nine times.