It is in the great setting of Genoa, not far from the iconic Lanterna that the Giro d’Italia gathers to face the fifth stage. There are 178 kilometers to travel to reach the finish line in Lucca, Tuscany. Route that offers first the beautiful Ligurian coast of the East, then the ascent to the Bracco Pass and travel, for the most part, along the route of state road no. 1 Aurelia with variation at the end to reach Lucca.
§ Genoa has a long tradition spanning over a hundred years of the pink race and, on the subject of two wheels, he always lives with passion his “Giro dell’Appennino” based in Pontedecimo, illustrated by a roll of honor of specific value. It is a city rich in history, monuments, traditions, with many variations, overlooking the sea with its important port. There were various runners in the Genoa area where cycling finds obligatory and demanding routes between the hills and the sea. A memory for the Olympic champion of Helsinki 1952 in the track quartet Mino De Rossi, born in Arquata Scrivia in 1931 and passed away in Genoa in 2022, good professional on the road and excellent, elegant, pistard, friend of Fausto Coppi and the Genoese Luigi Zaimbro (1936-2022), a good professional and others from more recent times. He was also Genoese by adoption Himerius Massignana well-known climber, passed away on Saturday 4 May with the funeral celebrated yesterday.
The actual start is in Quarto dei Mille, the historic embarkation point for Garibaldi’s expedition of the Thousand and stage finish won by the Belgian Willy Schroeders of the 1961 Giro d’Italia which celebrated the centenary of the Unification of Italy before embarking for the Sardinian stages.
§ The highly suggestive panoramic itinerary offers the Gulf of Tigulliobetween the sea and the mountains, offers in sequence, Sori, Recco which evokes water polo, a short ascent to the Camogli Route, then Rapallo, Zoagli and Chiavari, home to the pink race several times with arrivals and departures where it was born in 1995 Luca Raggioprofessional for two seasons.
§ We continue for Board where one ended stage of the 1994 Giro won in a sprint by Jan Svorada, Sestri Levante, an important center with the splendid Baia delle Favole, stage finish five times, a city frequented by historical figures. There is then an easy ascent to the Bracco Pass, with the passage into the province with the capital La Spezia. Carrodano, Borghetto di Vara, Padivarma and then Ceparana. Brief digression in the province of Massa Carrara, again that of Spezia, touching the panoramic territories of Santo Stefano di Magra, Sarzana and the historic Luni which gives its name to the defined area Lunigiana which, from a cycling perspective, proposes the homonymous junior stage race of the highest international quality.
§ Spezzini, from different eras, with first-rate palmarès, they are Massimo Podenzana and Alessandro Petacchi and the late Graziano Battistini, born in Fosdinovo (Massa Carrara) but lived in the province of Spezia. Again the province of Massa Carrara with the passage from the two cities also known throughout the world for their precious marble. Both have good cycling traditions.
§ Finally, you enter the province of Lucca through Pietrasanta, Capezzano Pianore, the hamlet of Camaiore and then Camaiore which evokes an important race with a notable roll of honor which, for about ten years, has become the constant starting point of the renowned Tirreno-Adriatico. You have to overcome the Montemagno gap, which is not impossible, along the road called locally “Freddana” to San Martino in Freddana and Monte San Quirico, already in the territory of Lucca, a splendid city with its walls.
§ Lucca and other places in the province are the custodians of a complex cycling activity that is difficult to summarize briefly, both in the organizational field and of sports groups of various categories – Fanini in evidence – and names of runners galore. Mario Cipollini is in the lead, by detachment, of this ranking, but we also mention Francesco Chicchi and, in times past, Giacomo Finito name a few.
§ The solution in the sprint seems to be the most predictable one but the wheel often turns and maneuvers cannot be ruled out to find out who will be the successor to Jonathan Milan, a splendid winner in Andora who could rightly aspire, given his leg, to an immediate encore .
