I'll try and keep it brief. You probably already know this is about a bike race. The GeeRow dee Talia. The tour of Italy. A month of crap roads over a lot of hills and some ridiculous Alps. It's hard on the support vehicles, sick-making for the motorbike cameras and a killer for the bike mechanics. Everyday it's a race within a race. The big prize is the trophy in Milan after it's all over, but this story is about today.
On the previous day to some breathless height near the Matterhorn, a young rider had to change his bike because of a mechanical problem. The original bike, worth about 10k, was left at the roadside and stolen. This morning the bike miraculously reappeared and young Matteo Rabottini got his bike back. And on this very bike, ol' Matt, sarcastically nick-named "Rambo," decided to ride away by himself at the beginning of a fearsome Alpine stage on a wretched day of cold rain, fog, and stupidly steep secondary roads.
We pick up the story at about the halfway point when our young fool has established a five minute lead on a group of eleven with serious reputations, and some 9 minutes ahead of the overall race leader, an ex-mountain bike champ from Canada. Ahead are three mountain passes, a selection of steep walls that would reduce most of us to hitch-hiking. Sure enough he survives most of these obstacles when we learn that his coach has taken away his map of the course so he has no idea what's coming. And what's coming is a heavy cold rain that doesn't quite turn to snow, an 8 kilometer uphill finish, and an attempt by Damiano, a previous
Giro winner, to take the race lead by racing away from his select group toward young Matt. Courageously, or naively, Matteo Rabottini, kills himself to keep up his advantage while Damiano, although unable to overtake Matteo, advances enough to establish himself as the virtual overall race leader.
All these steep hills have an equally steep descent on the other side where one might expect to get a short rest, but in these weather conditions snaking down steep swithbacks on skinny tires with brakes that don't work when wet... it's not very restful. Here Damiano really puts on the pressure. We watch nervously as Damiano sticks his foot out to stabilize himself and his bike wobbles right to the very edge of the cliff. He's going for broke. Then Rambo is down. He slides across the road, striking his back against the curb. Confused, he inspects his bike until a spectator gets him going with a shove in the right direction. He's still leading, but his shorts are torn and we imagine his Rambo recklessness must be exhausted by now.
On the final climb, just when the rumors begin to float that young Matteo is going to be allowed to win his day, the whole thing explodes. A Spaniard climbing specialist in Damiano's small group sprints away in chase of the tiring Matteo. The gang surrounding the Canadian overall race leader are going flat out, now some 5 minutes behind, when a number of hotheads bust out including another Spaniard, Joaquim, who continues to romp straight up and past all of our favorites including Damiano. This guy, Joaquim Rodriguez, a previous overall leader, has been waiting all day to give it full throttle in his effort to re-take the overall lead with a heroic stage win. Meanwhile the Spaniard #1 is gaining on Matteo, Damiano is fading backwards, the Canadian is fighting to protect his overall lead, and Joaquim is lost somewhere in the radio silence behind rain clouds.
When the slope eases with a few kilometers to go before the finish, Joaquim appears miraculously passing the Spaniard and powering his way toward Matteo as fast as an approaching freight train. Despite our wishes, poor Matteo is exhausted and finally unable to defend himself against the potential race leader on a raging mission to win everything. After all, Rambo is just a support rider, on a stolen bike, riding by himself, through terrible weather and terrain for over 150 kilometers against some of the world's strongest and best paid professionals. Sure enough, Joaquim roars up to him and steams past; and we resign ourselves to the inevitable. This is a professional sport and it's calculated to a fine degree. There's no room for fairly tales.
But no. Matteo hung in. He stuck his tired guts to the back wheel of Joaquim and followed him to the finish line. And then he passed Joaquim at the line. He won the stage. Matteo Rabottini, "Rambo," a nobody on a nobody team, beat the world's best on one of the toughest stages in one of the toughest races in the worst conditions all by himself.
Bravo Rambo.
