Cycling, Gran Piemonte: Viviani challenges Cavendish, Bettiol and Kooij

The great challenge of the sprinters before closing the season. Tomorrow appointment with the 106th Gran Piemonte, the RCS Sport / Gazzetta classic that anticipates the Giro di Lombardia by two days: Omegna-Beinasco, 198 km. Meeting in Omegna in viale Garibaldi at 10.20 am and departure at 11.40 am. In 2021 success of the British Matthew Walls (Bora).

Path This time we start from Omegna, the city on the slopes of Mottarone which is the home of the household industry. But above all here was born Gianni Rodari, writer, poet and pedagogist, who in his “Filastrocca del gregario” had perfectly understood the spirit of sacrifice and effort that animates those who have chosen to make a job out of the bicycle. Nursery rhyme of the gregarious / proletarian racer / who to the champions of trade / must act as a waiter / With the salary he gets / makes the family survive and as an old man then buys / a cyclist shop.

Omegna is in the province of Verbania: these are the lands of Filippo Ganna and Elisa Longo Borghini, the two champions who are marking an era in world cycling. It starts practically from Lake Orta, and then diagonally crosses the northern Po valley to arrive at the gates of Turin in the Collina di Superga area: the only roughness is the Salitella del Pilonetto, then the traditional descent on Pino Torinese, passage in front to the Savoy hunting lodge in Stupinigi and then the final sprint to Beinasco, just outside the city.

Departing 23 teams and 156 runners at the start. At the start many big names among the sprinters such as Mark Cavendish, Elia Viviani, who tomorrow will close the season on the road before facing the World Championships on track in Paris, Giacomo Nizzolo, Kaden Groves, Andrea Pasqualon, Simone Consonni, Olav Kooij, Stefano Oldani and Matteo Moschetti. There were numerous men from classics such as Alberto Bettiol, Matteo Trentin, Davide Ballerini, Matej Mohoric (fresh winner of the Tour of Croatia) and Marc Hirschi, and from laps such as Damiano Caruso and Mikel Landa.