Valtellina Basket Circuit is the main basketball summer league in Europe. Italian and international top teams indeed are glad to come to Bormio and other towns of the Sondrio district in order to play several pre-season games, which provide a great opportunity to test new players and to verify how the conditioning program is going. The matches are always characterized by great intensity and high quality game, so as to convince the most famous and successful teams to join the tournament every year. Nevertheless, since 1989 Valtellina Basket Circuit has been made non-competitive in order to downsize the likelihood of injuries and brawls, which unfortunately had taken place in the previous editions. Among the most common Italian participants are Montepaschi Siena (last season championship winner), Olimpia Milano, Pallacanestro Cantù and many second division teams, while the past editions also hosted Fortitudo and Virtus Bologna, Benetton Treviso, Virtus Roma and others. As for International teams, we find Israeli Maccabi Telaviv (2 times Euroleague champions), Turkish Efes Pilsen and Fenerbahce, Russian Dynamo Moskow and Khimky and many others. (Participants to all editions can be seen in the following table).
It goes without saying that all these important teams brought along invaluable players, which proved able to elicit great emotions through any single gesture they made on the court. Among them we find Carlton Myers, Henry Williams, Dominique Wilkins, Nando Gentile Dino Radja, Sasha Djordjevic, Gregor Fucka, Dino Meneghin and many others we don´t have the room to list here. Even His Majesty Michael Jeffrey Jordan played two times on Bormio´s court, but this is a story on its own.

Since the beginning of the new millennium, a new important has been added to Basket Circuit. In fact, it´s been eight years that the Italian National team comes to Bormio to hold a training camp and take part to an international tournament along with other European top teams in order to prepare for the international events scheduled at the end of each summer (European or world championship, Olympic games). The tournament is entitled "Diego Gianatti", in memory of the president of basketball operations of Sondrio´s team between 1968 and 1987. Italy came here for the first time with coach Bogdan Tanjevic, who had previously attended Basket Circuit very often when working for clubs, and stuck to this program also with coach Recalcati, who proved able to create a really committed group. Although the Gianatti tournament is just a stopover on the path to International events, Italy always played these games strenuously winning the 2000, 2001, 2004, 2005 e 2007 editions. After all, it is not by chance that all recent successes of Italy, as well as of other national teams partaking to the tournament, are somehow rooted in this training camp in Bormio. Italy won 2003 European bronze medal and 2004 Olympic silver medal; Lithuania won the 2003 European gold medal; Greece conquered the 2006 World silver medal. The picture is slightly different this year, as for the first time after six years Italy is not running for any international competition. After being ousted in the last European Champ, "Azzurri" are excluded from the Olympic games and have to play the qualification round for the next Europeans in August and September. Albeit less prestigious, it is still a key event for the future, to be prepared with great care. In Bormio, of course.

Here comes the turn of Women National Team, for the second straight year in Valtellina for the training camp. As it happens with Men, Italy is going to play an international tournament at the end of its stay, entitled "Olga De Marzi Gola" in memory of a great Sondrio´s basketball player dramatically died of a car accident several years ago. Italy, led by new coach Giampiero Ticchi, came to Bormio last year as well to prepare the European Champ organized in Italy. Along with Senior National Team, Bormio hosted the team for the World University Games (2003) and several youth national teams.

However unbelievable it might seem, also this legendary player played twice - and for free - in Valtellina, welcome by sold-out sport arenas.
Agosto 1985: right after leaving North Carolina, where he had been almost unstoppable, he was picked by thew Chicago Bulls. A few years later, this young and promising player, under contract with Nike, performed at Valtellina Basket Circuit, drawn here by some favorable circumstances of which Diego Pini immediately took advantage. As Pini recalls: «This whole deal was born in Caspoggio at 3 am, while I was having dinner with some basketball friends after a summer league game. Among us was Giorgio Campana, brother of well-known journalist Enrico, who came to Valtellina along with Caserta basketball team. Campana expressed his concern about the arrangement of Michael Jordan´s stay in Italy. He was about to perform in Trieste for a Stefanel-Caserta exhibition game, but nobody had arranged for his location in the days before the game. We all suggested that he could come to Bormio, but Campana argued that at least we had to arrange for a helicopter for transporting Michael. Although it was 3 am, we immediately phoned Maurizio Gandolfi, hotel owner in Bormio, and he warmly accepted our request, though casting the doubt that he had not realized which player was coming. Therefore, drinking the remainder of our grappa bottle, we signed the contract». Bormio´s Pentagono was packed and cheerful in celebrating the astonishing performance of this champion, provided with a unique talent for sinking shoots.

Agosto 1990: Jordan was already regarded as the best NBA player, but he had not won the title yet. This time, in order to increase the capacity, his exhibition was set in Palaghiaccio, the ice-hockey arena properly arranged to host a basketball game. Here´s an excerpt from the following day edition of La Gazzetta dello Sport, the main italian sport paper. «Thirty-eights point, seven dunks in some thirty minutes of play. No question, he is number one. People would like to get an autograph from him, perhaps with the excuse of the young child crying for it, and would do everything even to towel his back dry. No way, at the end of the game Michael runs into the locker room: how could he sign all autographs? How could he pose for every amateur photographer? There were tons of them in Bormio right beneath the basket. He´s always smiling and friendly towards other players on the court, and he respects the audience by playing tough. Nevertheless, there´s a slight gap between him and the surroundings, something like an indispensabile protection for a person in his condition. Otherwise, the pressure would be unbearable for this 27 years old guy, able to achieve both fame and wealth by working hard on the court».
Michael Jordan ended his career with six NBA titles, two Olympic gold medals and the fame of being the best basketball player ever. We had a chance to see him alive, for two times: that´s why his triumphs will be unforgettable for us.