I Wish I Loved the Giro

I cannot bring myself to love the Giro. As a Grand Tour, it is second best. Of course, I watch the coverage every day, cheer on my favorite cyclists, and prefer May to any month without a Grand Tour. Yet perhaps like a parent with a bunch of kids, I am a little less enamored of this one. I am sorry to admit, this one is a bit off.

The team rosters are a mixed bag. This year, the battle between Tyler Farrar and Mark Cavendish promised excitement, until Farrar withdrew following the death of his friend Wouter Weylandt. However, other teams bring their B-team to the Giro, instead focused on building up top players for the Tour de France in July or competing in the Tour of California which is scheduled during the middle of the Giro for the second year. Without those dynamic riders, I just cannot get worked up over the likes of Dennis Menchov or Vincenzo Nibali.

Watching from home, it does not help the situation that the television coverage is missing Phil Liggett and Paul Sherwin, whose combination of encyclopedic knowledge and colorful commentary is always compelling.

Despite these reasons, I wanted to love the Giro and traveled to see it in person in 2009. The race simply does not capture the country’s interest like the Tour de France. Locals would ask what brought me to Rome or Naples, and when I would respond, “For the Giro d’Italia,” they wrongly assumed I was on a tourist’s “tour of Italy.” Not one seemed aware that there was a bike race going on. When I ran into several Giro staff at my Naples hotel, even they were nonplussed by my long journey to see their race. The French were much more cheerful and interested when talking about the Tour.

The oddest moment at that Giro was near the mountain-top finish at Mt. Vesuvius. My whole trip had centered on this stage, and it was a journey within a journey to get up the mountain that afternoon. I hiked up the route and planned to stop when the crowds got too big and boisterous for me on my own. Yet to my surprise, those crowds never materialized. While spectators were present in the last few kilometers, there was also plenty of space for more, and I strolled up to the finish line with ample elbow room. This was a mixed blessing for me, since the sparseness of the crowd allowed me to enjoy a mountain-top finish of a Grand Tour, but the anemic turn-out was a disappointment.

Even those local fans in attendance were oddly sedate. When the cyclists appeared in the last 350 meters, most spectators remained quiet. Their blasé response surprised me. How could they watch men grinding their way to the finish line after five hours of racing and not be impressed? Why bother to show up? The biggest response from the locals was to laugh at a couple of Americans, law students from Iowa decked out in pink Giro gear, jumping up and down, cheering on each rider by name. These guys made the experience cheerful for me, as the collective love for the sport is part of the fun of traveling to races.

Whether in person or remotely, I am not inspired by the Giro as much as other races. While I continue to follow the Giro everyday, I want the best riders, the best fans, the best everything. I always thought pink was my favorite color, but now I guess I prefer yellow.