There can be no madness without knowledge. But the fan does not forget what the ancient prophets taught him, the Giradengo, Coppi, Bartali, Tarangu, Merckx: a window to the infinity and the clouds of the Alps that almost play with the tip of the fingers, because so high climb, more than 2,000 meters, where the oxygen is so light Bocked, by his gravel path, with his sweat, his pain; That there can be no madness without bold crazy people who guided by his desire, his dreams, attack and accelerate where the body asks for calm, rest, 14 from the top, as far away, as Isaac of the bull responds, and counterattack Simon Yates, the English with pending accounts with the mountain, and with the turn. They are two against one. The old, 32 years each, proud of his time, against the 21 -year -old boy. 60 minutes that moved the turn.
Only then can the emotion sprout. Gallina skin, tachycardia. Only from there the glory can be born, the flowers that will rain on the winner, the only one who has challenged destiny without looking back. Smelly and soft petals.
Ahead, then, two dozen runners. Only one resists the arrival of the champions, the Australian of Melbourne Chris Harper, 30, leader of the purple Jayco, and his veteran soul of unbridled adventurer from the antipodes.
It is the battle of three champions, with very different three lives too, three worlds, two epochs, which review the Film and there they interpret their mission. It is the victory of Simon Yates, third in the stage, which today will be proclaimed in Rome winning the 108th Tour of Italy. On the podium, the two great defeated: second, of the bull, 3m 56s, that gives the Rosa Maglia that has dressed 11 days; Third, Richard Carapaz, at 4m 43s.
In the Finestre –2,178 meters, 19 kilometers at 9% continuous, 45 twisted horseshoe curves on the hillside, 8 kilometers of gravel, and then a minimum decrease up to 1,400 meters and ascension lying up to 2,000m of the Sestriere station – talks about the footprint of Savoldelli, of Landa, of Accountant; From the English that seemed crazy when he attacked in 2018 to sink the superb Simon Yates, and it was a lonely and controlled madness, calculated, every hour an assistant with carbohydrates to feed his energy. It was a revolution that Yates suffered as nobody and Carapaz contemplated in spite of, the fourth classified of that turn, impotent persecutor of the science of English. Del Toro was then 14 years old, a kid who spent the day with his Mountain Bike or playing football, still oblivious to a world that would catch him, and only years later saw and revived a thousand times the film of the epic madness of Froome, and understood everything. Seven years later, time feed is the norm. There is no longer a position or two of solid supplies with bags and a can of cocacola to eruption, but five positions, one every 35-40 kilometers, to receive drums and gels and gelatins, more than 150 grams of carbohydrates per hour, more than 8,000 calories of spending that must be energized.
Carapaz was born at 2,800my, he breathes height, and five in the morning he rose to milked the cows. He becomes a cyclist because in his Andes, on the border with Colombia, it is the sport that allows peasants to flee from the condemnation of the earth and poverty. Yates is English from Burly, along with Manchester, son of cycling fashion that revived on the islands with the Wiggins Tour, Sky science, the Froome Tours. Pioneers of the concentrations in the Teide to thicken the blood, oxygenate it. Del Toro is from the coast and the sea, 16 meters of altitude its ensenada, of a country without cycling tradition; To get out of poor, boxer or footballer can be made, to have fun, the waves can surf, and choose cycling because a madman of the bikes is dedicated to looking for talents throughout Mexico, and in a San Marino laboratory it is built and grows. The altitude, that of Sestieriere, that of Sierra Nevada, breathes it in the concentrations guided by the hypoxia lessons that his coach, the South African Jeroen Swart, head of doctors at the UAE, and understands it so well, assimilates it as a nate of France, in the Iseran, 2,764 meters above sea level, or in the Col de la Lze. 2,300m.
Del Toro, splendid longilíneo, 1.80m, 64 kilos, is a digital native, a high performance athlete that puts the most; Carapaz, more chaparro, 1.70m, 62 kilos, so powerful or more; Yates, lighter, 1.72m, 58 kilos, but, they always say it on his team, he fell into the small marmita and does not know his limits. It reaches the penultimate stage as third in the general, 1m 21s from Del Toro.
Yates accelerate. He leaves. Carapaz persecutes and for. He fears Del Toro, not the eldest of the Yates brothers. Of the bull watches. Excess of lucidity made cyclist. Always to the fawn of Carapaaz triggered, impatient. A Surplace of Velodrome. Lanterns. Of the bull does not dispersed. Just think of Carapaz. He sleeps contemplating the only wheel. Take advantage of the will of Derek Gee, the fourth man. Wait for you to run out to act. Cold. Calm. It is Anquetil, a Boeing, an IBM, a wiring that metabolizes everything. It is a dangerous game that costs Carapaz’s enmity, which costs him the turn.
Yates leaves, as much gasoline as if the turn had passed by saving it, because it has always run hidden, without giving an more pedal. One day. A single blow. Efficiency is science. Not the epic. Not madness. The attack of the undervalued rival. Forgotten Invisible. A 32 Maglia is already Maglia Rosa Virtual. 1m 40s advantage.
Only then moves from the bull. Squeezed his companions, it’s him. The gravel is its second land. The rose, his skin. His death. Yates, sitting on your serious bike. Sky -inherited visma technology in her jersey. He, sitting, steep the Pogacar. With Gee, with Carapaz. Galleotes chained to each other. Tied to the ground that grabs them. His will has crashed into his limits. They advance to spasms and for. The Palestinian flags in the dry land gutter show the way. It undertakes Carapaz. Of the bull, always to wheel. Madness is the gutter. Thousands of fond of fans. Stadium madness. They stop.
1m 40s at the top. From the bull leads the descent. Go Aert, head of the visma bridge, wait for Yates in a curve. From the bull he raises his foot. It is the end. There is no more. The young man and the old man do not collaborate. They are no longer two adventurers who have nothing to lose. They lose love for what they have, fear for what can happen. They give the victory before fighting for her. Damn Tacticism, condemns the fans, which demands absolute altruism in its champions, and cries, as cries, defeated by emotion, Simon Yates next to the fences of Sestriere. Del Toro arrives more than five minutes later and sprint to be ninth. Smile. Greet. Hug your friend Pellizzari. A weight has been removed. Del Toro has been afraid to win. He wants to be a normal boy. Carapaz has not been able to. “He lost his turn. He has not been able to run well and has won the smartest,” laments Carapaz, and the old remember how Roglic and Nibali stopped each other when Ecuadorian, who has written and suffered the story, won the 19th turn. He lost proud Latin America.
Yates has won a lap, the 18, and had lost two turns, the 18 and the 21st against Egan. Perseverance has rewarded him. And intelligence.
