This trail follow the path of a group of partisan fighters that during WWII, in the year 1943, escaped from the prison camp located in Cortemaggiore and hid themselves in this woods until in 1945 they were chased and killed by the german army. The trail is dedicated to the commander Giovanni Grcavaz and marked with signs displayng the acronyms GLS that stands for the nickname Giovanni Lo Slavo. Since 2017 a group of runners from the region around Piacenza keep memory of the best times on this loop. The trail starts and finish from the museum of the resistance located in the site called Sperongia otside of wich is placed a cannon, in the mouth of the cannon is placed a notebook where they write the time of each attempt. at the moment the fastest known time is held by Demetrio Castignola who ran 1h15'02" on the 27 june 2020; and as far as i know this is the first trail in Piacenza that is not a race course where runners keeps memory of the fastest known times. traditionally the rout is run counterclockwise and despite the loop can be started in many places and hikers usually add the stretches that link the loop to some caracteristic places, the FKT traditionally add the stretch that link the museum to the loop and back to te museum, where the trailhead is located.
here's Demetrio Strava activity:
https://www.strava.com/activities/3679977346/overview
you can find info abouth the story of the partisan Giovanni lo Slavo and the events of the war in this area on the following links:
https://paesaggioememoria.it/it/sentieri/sentiero-1-giovanni-lo-slavo/
https://www.gracpiacenza.com/sentiero_giovanni_lo_slavo.html
https://www.partigianipiacentini.it/storia/divisione-val-darda/
the first time that runners started the challenge on this trail and started to record FKTs can be found here:
https://spiritotrail.it/forum/topic/16840
