Bella Italia ist sehr gut…

In this part of Italy, the Giro is not a big deal. In fact, it would be hard to tell that it is going to pass right through the town of Valdaora in which am staying. But, in two days, the riders will come down from the Passo Furcia and race right into the center of Valdaora then into the Val Pusteria on their way to a finish in Falzes, just above Brunico. Around here the locals would say that the racers would be going over the Furkelpass through MittelOlang and on to Pfalzen. It’s hard to find anyone who speaks Italian in these parts and I’m told there’s still some resentment that the Allies gave Italy this part of Austria after the First World War.

I rode over the Furkelpass (Passo Furcia) this morning; it’s a 12 kilometer uphill slog that hits a very nice 16 percent for a 75 meter stretch (I counted the hundredths as I crept along at 5 kph) and the Giro boys will tackle it on the 15^th stage. Getting to the Giro route from where we’re staying isn’t too hard, go out the back door and turn right and there it is. To go over the Passo Furcia the way the racers will on Tuesday, I had to loop around the Kronplatz Mountain using the Alta Pusteria bike path, then ride along the Gadura Valley to join the Giro route and the climb at Longega. The ride was uphill along the wildly flowing Gadura river, full from snow melt. The road was not in great shape, it is being replaced by a series of new tunnels and the riverside road is hoisted temporarily over the roaring river with some interesting engineering. Traffic was light, so no problems.

At Longega, I joined the Giro route as it came down from the big passes of Falzarego and Valparola. If they show these on OLN, you will see another Lunar Landscape like the top of Mount Ventoux, except that there’s snow all around and the mountains climb precipitously around the pass. There’s a scary looking funicular lift that takes people up the side of a vertical cliff some 400 feet up over the pass. The temperature on the pass was minus-one Celsius and it was snowing when we drove over yesterday and there was not a cyclist in sight, despite the fact that the Giro was headed that way in two days. There’s also a striking lack of marking on the roads.

Yesterday we ran into “The devil” on the road to Cortina. He was parked in his van on a turn-out, the oversized bike hooked on the back. He looked a little glum and explained in Esperanglish to us that he was waiting for things to dry out before he headed off to find his spot and mark the road with his tridents. We learned a little more about “The Devil” this time because he gave us his card. Believe it or not, this guy seems to make a life, if not a living, out of showing up at major cycling events in a red devil suit waving his soft trident running alongside the riders as they creep up a mountain stage. He showed us a recent newspaper where he was pictured with a famous old bike rider, Joop Zoetemelk, the devil having done his thing at some race in Belgium.

I studied his post-card picture with his details on the back. His name is Didi Senft, El Diablo, and you can reach him on the web at http://www.luk.de/Aktuelles/index.html. He was born in 1952 in Reichenwalde near Berlin and lives in Storkow—when he’s not on the road. His card describes his 17 entries in the Guinness Book of World Records but those are mostly about his big bike, which he claims is rideable.

We’re sitting in our apartment in Olang (Upper) watching the finish of the13th stage of the race. Italian television coverage of the Giro is pretty much wall-to-wall, with the usual heavy dose of interviews and touristic helicopter shots of the local monuments. One thing they did over-cover today were crashes; falling riders seem to get a lot of coverage, slow-mo—the works. Today’s were minor so there was only wincing but no moaning as we watched.

Today the Giro had a finish in Pula, Croatia, right next to a Roman coliseum and there was a lot of coverage of the arena, probably to remind the world that this was once part of Italy. The show signed off with rose-tinted (really) shots of Fausto Coppi. There’s lots of homage to the past greats during the whole of the television coverage, as if the best days were of yore. But today’s etappa was termed “historic” by Alessandro Petacchi, who won his seventh stage of this year’s Giro.

Back to my struggle over the Furkelpass. This was a strain but I managed a decent ascent in a little over an hour. The pass is at a ski station, closed for the season, and only a single mountain-biker was there, changing his gear for the descent. A little further on at a turn-out a group of motorcyclists were resting from their ascent. I took the opportunity to stop to put on my wind jacket and noticed that the Harley Riders were all at least 60 years old.

The downhills, like the uphills are steeper here than in France and that means creative braking and steering. The occasional racing driver would loom into view, usually across the theoretical center line, there being no marking at all on the road since it was newly paved for the Giro, but this happened just twice on the 10 kilometer descent.

I managed to pass up an opportunity to do a time trial today. When we were in a bike shop in Cortina d’Ampezzo, Bici Cortina, the owner’s son gave me a brochure for a 17 km “chrono” that would run into the center of Cortina. He was a champion local time-trialler and I’m sure he wanted me to help expand the prize pot that he likely would take away. Still, it was tempting, to pull up to the line in Italy and ride off with powerful pedal strokes. Reality shuddered through my 200-plus pound body as he mentioned the uphill parts and I knew right away that this was not the thing for me. Besides, it would probably take me an embarassingly long time to clip in in front of people who actually know what a bike race is.

I’ve attached the profile of the Furkelpass, just to show you that it’s no cakewalk.

Back to the start, OR, on to the next chapter