Belgian sprinter wins in the mountains’. As insults went, for a climber like Zilioli, it was a cracker.
‘No wonder I looked miserable as sin when a photographer asked me to pose with Eddy just after I’d seen that,’ Zilioli says now. He goes on, ‘Of course Eddy won again two days later. With hindsight, that should have been another penny dropping…’
Only with hindsight?
As the man, Zilioli, said, Merckx won again two days after his maiden grand tour stage win on the Blockhaus, this time in a bunch sprint in Lido degli Estensi. The boy, it seemed, could do everything – within reason; after a farcical stage to the Tre Cime di Lavaredo, won by Gimondi but declared null and void because too many of the riders had been pushed up the final climb, the cream rose to the top on the final mountain stage to Tirano. Either that or, if the rumours were to be believed, a ‘
santa alleanza degli italiani
’ or holy Italian alliance allowed Gimondi to attack the race leader Jacques Anquetil after the Passo del Tonale and easily set up overall victory. Any Italian ‘in’ on the deal was said to have pocketed a tidy sum in return for declining to help Anquetil’s chase.
While Gimondi was heading for his second major tour title and a first Giro d’Italia to add to the Tour de France he had won on his début in 1965, Merckx, alas, had capitulated on the Passo del Tonale. At least he was in good company; Franco Bitossi had started the Giro with big ambitions, won the first mountain stage on Mount Etna, but was now in freefall down the general classification.
‘Crazy Heart’, they called Bitossi. His family had been the very incarnation of the Tuscan idyll, before mass tourism and before ‘Chiantishire’, with their farmhouse in Camaioni on the banks of the River Arno, 15 kilometres upstream from Florence and a short boat crossing from the nearest road. One day, though, Franco couldn’t recall exactly what age he was, he had run out of the house to find his mother shrieking at the water’s edge. His younger brother Al was missing and, when he heard his mum scream, little Franco was certain that he had drowned in the Arno. As his mind raced, his heart pounded at double, treble its normal speed. Al was fine, and found within minutes, but the drumming under Franco’s ribcage continued. It would abate soon enough, but also return with distressing regularity once Franco had decided to pursue a career in cycling. Crazy Heart’s first two seasons in the professional peloton had been hellish, yielding zero victories and innumerable variations on the same, tragicomic scene: a flash of heels, a blur of jet black hair, Bitossi clear of the field and then, moments later, stationary at the side of the road, hunched over his handlebars. Gradually, though, after numerous threats to give up, and races like the 1966 Coppa Agostoni where he had ridden rings around Merckx and Gimondi, been forced by palpitations to stop ten times, yet still nearly beaten them, he had reconciled himself to the problem and by doing so eased its symptoms. A barnstorming start to the 1967 season even had some wondering whether he might be the next ‘
campionissimo
’, but the Giro and in particular the Dolomites and Alps had cut Bitossi down to size, just as they had Merckx.
As they struggled on together up the Tonale, flanked also by Merckx’s teammate Ferdinand Bracke, Merckx coughed, wheezed and cursed the journalists who had kept him answering questions in the freezing cold after the previous day’s stage to Trento. Whenever the gradient became steeper, Bitossi looked across at him and jotted mental notes.
Four days later, the Giro had finished with Gimondi the winner and Merckx in ninth position. Bitossi opened
La Gazzetta dello Sport
and read attentively. One of the godfathers of Italian sports journalism, Bruno Raschi, had reviewed the previous three weeks’ action and judged each of the main protagonists individually. Bitossi looked for
‘No wonder I looked miserable as sin when a photographer asked me to pose with Eddy just after I’d seen that,’ Zilioli says now. He goes on, ‘Of course Eddy won again two days later. With hindsight, that should have been another penny dropping…’
Only with hindsight?
As the man, Zilioli, said, Merckx won again two days after his maiden grand tour stage win on the Blockhaus, this time in a bunch sprint in Lido degli Estensi. The boy, it seemed, could do everything – within reason; after a farcical stage to the Tre Cime di Lavaredo, won by Gimondi but declared null and void because too many of the riders had been pushed up the final climb, the cream rose to the top on the final mountain stage to Tirano. Either that or, if the rumours were to be believed, a ‘
santa alleanza degli italiani
’ or holy Italian alliance allowed Gimondi to attack the race leader Jacques Anquetil after the Passo del Tonale and easily set up overall victory. Any Italian ‘in’ on the deal was said to have pocketed a tidy sum in return for declining to help Anquetil’s chase.
While Gimondi was heading for his second major tour title and a first Giro d’Italia to add to the Tour de France he had won on his début in 1965, Merckx, alas, had capitulated on the Passo del Tonale. At least he was in good company; Franco Bitossi had started the Giro with big ambitions, won the first mountain stage on Mount Etna, but was now in freefall down the general classification.
‘Crazy Heart’, they called Bitossi. His family had been the very incarnation of the Tuscan idyll, before mass tourism and before ‘Chiantishire’, with their farmhouse in Camaioni on the banks of the River Arno, 15 kilometres upstream from Florence and a short boat crossing from the nearest road. One day, though, Franco couldn’t recall exactly what age he was, he had run out of the house to find his mother shrieking at the water’s edge. His younger brother Al was missing and, when he heard his mum scream, little Franco was certain that he had drowned in the Arno. As his mind raced, his heart pounded at double, treble its normal speed. Al was fine, and found within minutes, but the drumming under Franco’s ribcage continued. It would abate soon enough, but also return with distressing regularity once Franco had decided to pursue a career in cycling. Crazy Heart’s first two seasons in the professional peloton had been hellish, yielding zero victories and innumerable variations on the same, tragicomic scene: a flash of heels, a blur of jet black hair, Bitossi clear of the field and then, moments later, stationary at the side of the road, hunched over his handlebars. Gradually, though, after numerous threats to give up, and races like the 1966 Coppa Agostoni where he had ridden rings around Merckx and Gimondi, been forced by palpitations to stop ten times, yet still nearly beaten them, he had reconciled himself to the problem and by doing so eased its symptoms. A barnstorming start to the 1967 season even had some wondering whether he might be the next ‘
campionissimo
’, but the Giro and in particular the Dolomites and Alps had cut Bitossi down to size, just as they had Merckx.
As they struggled on together up the Tonale, flanked also by Merckx’s teammate Ferdinand Bracke, Merckx coughed, wheezed and cursed the journalists who had kept him answering questions in the freezing cold after the previous day’s stage to Trento. Whenever the gradient became steeper, Bitossi looked across at him and jotted mental notes.
Four days later, the Giro had finished with Gimondi the winner and Merckx in ninth position. Bitossi opened
La Gazzetta dello Sport
and read attentively. One of the godfathers of Italian sports journalism, Bruno Raschi, had reviewed the previous three weeks’ action and judged each of the main protagonists individually. Bitossi looked for
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