I was there, while Gianni Mura typed this manifesto of heroic cycling on his old Olivetti. In the RAI caravan, where I had an appointment at the finish of the Montalcino stage, Mura had just returned from discussing the stage on TV and a certain doubt prevailed about the appropriateness of including white roads in a great Giro. I said that precisely those muddy faces, that engaging and cathartic show, could end up being of interest to people beyond the hard core that normally followed cycling. Those images would attract new eyes to the feelings evoked by extreme fatigue, the conquest that pushes us to our human limits. 

Immediately afterwards, as soon as Mura started tapping on his Olivetti, the newspaper called: "Gianni, could you double the size of your article? We don't know why, maybe it was all that mud, but today at the newspaper, we all watched the stage and that practically never happens". 

I was there helping to write the greatest paradox of Montalcino: "The more it goes back to its roots, the more cycling moves forward, filling our eyes and touching our hearts". 

Giancarlo Brocci