Cycling as sport in Italy began similarly as in France but some years later. In Italy, the “heroic age of cycling”-for males- was strongly connected to nationalistic ideals, the Giro d’Italia was born in 1909 and a few years later, bicycles became a common tool in WWI. In the 1930’s, the popularity of cycling facilitated what become a battlefield for conquering the minds and hearts of citizens through politicized cycling clubs. In the 1940’s and 1950’s, while the country was trying to recover from WW2 devastation, Italian –male- cycling was at its peak of popularity, in its golden age. Today, in spite of the automobile, cycles are very popular as transportation and leisure machines in many Italian cities, and cycling competition continues to be a cherished sport. Female cycling however, has its own story. Women on a bicycles were seen as a manifestation of the devil and subject to laughing stock during the 19th century and half of the 20th. But for women, the bicycle was a possibility of freedom of mobility, of liberty previously limited by the rigid customs of the time, as well as by the sensitivity of the period. The bicycle has redefined the social and even political role of the female universe. The end of the nineteenth century became an era of movement, leisure, speed, but above all freedom. In regards to sport, women had to stumble their way through most of the 20th century, until finally, in 1985 the Italian female cyclist begins to cycle and compete officially with ever greater diffusion.