HISTORY | 06/25/2024 | 08:08
by Paolo Broggi
A great little love story: for cycling, for Italy and for the Giro d’Italia. The main character is Rene Koppert, 63 years old, former professional runner for Bruno Reverberi’s teams, who invented a strange, different, unique race.
It all started in 2020, in the middle of the pandemicwhen Koppert sat down at the computer, began to design a circuit around the city of ‘s-Hertogenbosch: not just any circuit, but a route in the shape of Italy and its Giro. An idea born from the lockdown, given that René could not return to Italy in those weeks to hug his children, as he usually does.
The route was then perfected… on the bike and is now also available on Strava-Art. The result is a 95 kilometer long Giro d’Italia which has as its starting point ‘s-Hertogenbosch, a beautiful city with origins dating back to 1185, which hosted both a stage of the Tour de France and one of the Vuelta. The route is not competitive and takes place on public roads and cycle paths through villages and the beautiful nature of Brabant (South Holland).
The next step was even more important: organizing a ride with a social purpose. So Sunday 9 June almost 300 cyclists met in the Brabant region (Holland) faced the challenge of riding the Giro d’Italia in one day. Participants used their healthy muscles to raise money for research for… the diseased muscles of children less fortunate than others. By cycling they raised 18,000 euros for the Spieren voor Spieren charity.
In career René Koppert wore, among others, the Termolan jersey, then that of Santini and participated twice in the (real) Giro d’Italia. Precisely on the occasion of his first Giro d’Italia he met an Italian girl who he married and with whom he had three children who now live in Italy and this is why he now visits the Bel Paese a couple of times a year, always with his racing bike in tow, of course…
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