There has always been and there is still a cycling of gentlemen and it could only be here to White roads. The “sixth” monument, heroic challenge with and without quotes with and without capital and tiny, is honored and ennobled by two champions such as Tadej Pogacar And Tom Pidcock. One eighty kilometers on the run together and in the end the world champion appears, with the torn body, with a bleeding elbow, with a half -hematoma on the thigh for a fall, accurate but still impregnable that he signs a trio and makes the honor of the weapons to an opponent who tried until he was able to remain on the wheel. They embrace at the end: “All very nice” He would have said the great Bruno Pizzul. White roads nineteen number that all tell each other in the eighty kilometers of escape from Pogacar and Pidcock with Connor Swift Third inclined only for a while. Eighty kilometers fast, tiring and surprising, together to play them, to look at each other, to take care, to respect each other.
There is still an ancient cycling of gentlemen And it could not be on these dusty streets in the heart of a Tuscany that was able to preserve them and make them become heritage and culture to defend. And then, when there are about seventy kilometers away at the finish, if Pidcock is missing the refueling Pogacar thinks about taking a bottle from his bag and offering it to him. So when Pogacar loses control of his bike in the descent of Collepinzuto and flies, fortunately his and everyone in a escarpment where there are no obstacles, Pidcock does not go but slows down, turns a couple of times and only when he sees the Polish who gets up and goes up towards the road, starts pedaling. Then, after about ten minutes, he decides to get up and wait but this is not kindness but only a calculation, because Pogacar chases him double the speed and therefore it is useless to waste energy 40 kilometers from the arrival.
And this is a cycling that gives reason to dreamers, romantics and who has this sport in the heart and soul. The nineteenth time of the White roads It is still that of Tadej, The first time of a world champion in Piazza del Campo, the third victory for him who also triumphed here last year and who had made his professional debut in 2019 in the races of a day arriving. It is not the right time is the right time, very right. Waiting, announced, not obvious because Pidcock tries to make him hard life and because the fall of Collle Pinzuto is no small matter. An absurd, high -speed flight with the rear of the bike that loses adherence and the Slovenian ending up in a shoe after a chills. But it looks like rubber: it gets up, changes bikes and starts stronger than before. “I went too fast- he tells the finish line- I risked too much, I know these roads like those of my house but maybe I had too much desire to win …”
And in the end he wins. Because here only the great and great win. Only those who have class and courage wins, those who are capable of rewinding the ribbon and bringing cycling back in time, where you get to the expelled, where you have to dirty your hands and not only the hands because the dust comes everywhere, where the teams crumble and the tactics are of little or perhaps nothing. It only happens here, only in the lands that Heroicwith a capital, he has retained by returning them to history and a sport that perhaps has gone too fast in recent years and has lost some of its origin on the way. Too much haste, too much technology, too many races, too many interests, too many bikes, too much of everything to confuse myth and legend with useless stages and orders of arrivals not always up to par.
It was needed a challenge that led to rediscover the soul and mechanicsto get up on the pedals to jump via Brecciole, holes and cunnette that are parked in front of you on climbs you don’t expect. With the wheels that slip, they become imminent, they stop on the hardest tears, with the unknowns of a breakdown or a drilling that escape tactics and algorithms. Where you fall and get up. It was needed and here: the Tolfe, Pieve di Santa Santamaria, Castelnuovo della Berardenga, Colle Pinzuto, La Strada del Castagno, Monte Sante Marie between dirt roads, sectors and a Tuscany that leaves you breathless for elegance and beauty.
And it always ends how it should end. The best wins. Tadej Pogacar wins from a proud Tom Pidckoc and Belgian Tim Wellens who is teammate from Slovenian. Pogacar falls a trio that allows him to support another great as Fabian Cancellara and makes everyone understand that this year too the same score will sound. A little decent but smiling enjoyed Piazza del Campo and the hugs of his. Then a minute stops waiting for Pidcock who greets with a hug. Once upon a time there was cycling of gentlemen and white roads maybe there is a little more …