7 April: World Health Day. It is celebrated every year to commemorate the founding of the WHO on 7 April 1948.

Health is a topic we feel very strongly about: not only because of NBS’s ability to prevent tibial periostitis in athletes, but because of a wider issue of health and sport going hand in hand.

Let’s learn to embrace sport all round, our bodies and minds will thank you.

So let us introduce you to Donato Vassalli: doctor of the Italian national rugby team, sporty and unpredictable, like many other characters from NBS Stories

Born in Cilento and Tuscan by adoption, Donato Vassalli is a doctor, specialist in rheumatology and S.A. of the Italian Sports Medicine Federation.

He has taught at the Pitiè Salpetriere University in Paris, and is now a lecturer at the Master of Physiotherapy and Rehabilitation in Sport at the University of Siena and scientific head of the 360 Sport Wellness Lab.

He has also been on the staff of the Italian national rugby team for years and follows athletes of national and international interest in other sports.

Sport, health and a great passion for travel

“I began to travel seriously when I won the ‘Renault on the roads of the world’ competition: forty days in a Renault 4, touring the former Soviet Union. From then on, the trips became more and more unusual and unpredictable.

From the walking expedition in the Parque National Torres del Paine (Chilean Patagonia), to crossing the Altai Mountains and part of the Gobi Desert (Outer Mongolia), from trekking the Colca Canyon to the Camino Real in Peru. He travels in the Himalayas, Kashmir, Ladack and Zanskar.

In Indonesia, where he organised an expedition in a kayak and rubber dinghy, and in Greenland, where he was the protagonist of a self-sufficient expedition with a sleddog and a special sledge pulled by kites.

But also: the Fezzan desert (between Libya, Chad and Niger) on foot and by camel, and then Lapland, Kazakhstan, India, Romania, Siberia, Finland, Argentina and the Arctic Circle in Norway.

“The last trip, for now, was for charity in the Salar de Uyuni, in the Bolivian Andes, which I crossed in a cart pulled by sails”.

360 SPORT WELLNESS LAB: a laboratory at the service of sport

In addition to his great passion for travel, he also loves his work.

360 Sport Wellness Lab is a new project, a space “with different and synergic professionalism (doctors, athletic trainers, psychologists, video analysts and athletes), at the service of professional and amateur athletes, but also to support those who carry out non-competitive motor activity and those who want to keep fit with correct lifestyles.

We offer a variety of evaluations, support teams, athletes and trainers in their work and are also dedicated to preparing for expeditions, sporting endeavours or endurance races.

Spoiler 2022: the Tor Des Geants

A little sneak peek:
By the way, someone told us that you are working on preparations for one of the most fascinating races on the world endurance scene: the TOR DES GEANTS.

“At the moment we are working, together with NBS, on an interesting project on the Tor Des Geants 2022“.

In fact Donato together with his team will be busy following the athletes of the NBS team in one of the most fascinating races of the world endurance scene.

“We will be there to assess the basic condition of the athletes from a nutritional, metabolic, biomechanical and psychological point of view. We will be interested in optimising their preparation and performance, reducing the likelihood of injury, better managing fatigue, stress and sleep deprivation. Not an easy challenge, but a very stimulating one!”