The Story of the Giro d'Italia

by Carol McGann

  Criterium: A bike race around and around a short road course, often a city block. Good criterium riders have excellent bike handling skills and usually possess lots of power to enable them to constantly accelerate out of the corners. The Dutch and the Belgians are the masters of the event.

  Crono: Italian, short for time-trial. See Cronometro, Time Trial.

  Cronometro: Italian for time trial. Cronometro individuale is individual time trial and cronometro a squadre is team time trial.

  Cronoscalata: Italian for an individual timed hill climb.

  Cyclamen Jersey: The purple jersey of the points leader in the Giro until 2010, when the points leader began wearing a red jersey.

  Défaillance: French for a total mental or body collapse. See Bonk for more.

  Directeur Sportif: The on-the-road manager of a bike team. Although French, it is the term used in English as well. Often shortened to DS.

  Direttore Sportivo: Italian for directeur sportif.

  DNF: Did not finish. Used in results to denote that the racer started but did not complete the race.

  DNS: Did not start. Used in results to denote a racer who was entered in a race but failed to start. Often seen in results in stage races where the rider abandons after the completion of the previous stage. In the Tour it’s NP for non-partant.

  Domestique: French. See gregario.

  Drafting: At racing speed a rider who is only a few inches behind another bike does about 30 percent less work. Riding behind another rider in his slipstream is called drafting. This is the basic fact of bike racing tactics and why a rider can only with the greatest difficulty ride away from the others, no matter how strong he is. Only in the rarest of cases can a racer stay away from a determinedly chasing peloton. To make an escape work he needs the pack to be uninterested in chasing for some length of time so that he can gain a large enough time gap. Then, when the sleeping pack is aroused it does not have enough time to catch him no matter how fast it chases. Hugo Koblet’s wonderful solo escape in the 1951 Tour is one of the rare instances when a solo rider outdid a determined group of elite chasers. A rider who drafts others and refuses to go to the front and do his share of the work is said to be “sitting on”. There are a number of pejorative terms for a rider who does this, the best known is “wheelsucker”.

  Drop: When a rider cannot keep up with his fellow riders and comes out of their slipsteam, whether in a break or in the peloton, he is said to be dropped.

  Echelon: When the riders are hit with a side wind they must ride slightly to the right or left of the rider in front in order to remain in that rider’s slipstream, instead of riding nose to tail in a straight line. This staggered line puts those riders further back in the pace line in the gutter. Because they can’t edge further to the side, they have to take more of the brunt of both the wind and the wind drag of their forward motion. Good riders then form a series of echelons so that all the racers can contribute and receive shelter. Italian is ventaglio.

  Escape: When used as a noun it is a breakaway. When used as a verb it is the act of breaking away.

  Feed zone: The specific point along a race route where the riders pick up food and drink. Racing etiquette generally keeps racers from attacking at this point, but there have been some famous initiatives that have started while the riders were having musettes (bags) of food handed up. In 1987 a plot to attack Jean-François Bernard who was then leading the Tour was executed by Charly Mottet and his Système U team. They informed Stephen Roche and Pedro Delgado of their plans so that they would have enough horsepower to carry it through, which they did.

  Field: See Peloton.

  Field Sprint: The race at the finish for the best placing among those in the peloton. The term is usually used when a breakaway has successfully escaped and finished the stage, and the peloton is reduced to fighting for the remaining lesser places.

  Fixed gear: A direct drive between the rear wheel and the cranks. The rear cog is locked onto the rear hub so that the rider cannot coast. When the rear wheel turns, the crank turns. Because this is the most efficient of all possible drive trains, riders in the early days of cycle racing preferred fixed gears to freewheels. When mountains became part of racing in the early twentieth century, the riders had to mount freewheels so that they could coast down the descents; otherwise their velocity was limited by their leg speed. Track bikes use fixed gears.

  Flahute: French slang for tough-guy bike racer, usually Belgian. A Flahute thrives on the cold-weather, rain, winds, slippery cobbles and sustained high speeds that characterize the Belgian Classics. A Flahute should expect to taste wet cow dung thrown up by the other riders’ wheels as they race across barely usable farm country roads. Examples: Marcel Kint, Walter Godefroot, Roger de Vlaeminck, Rik van Looy and Rik van Steenbergen.

  Flyer: Usually a solo breakaway near the end of a race.

  Foratura: Italian for flat tire.

  Fuga: Italian for breakaway.

  Fuga di Bidone: Italian for a particular kind of successful break. A fuga di bidone generally escapes early in a stage and is initially innocent-looking, but because of inaction on the part of the peloton, a large time gap occurs that becomes dangerous to the main General Classification contenders. Often hidden in a fuga bidone is a quality rider who, as a result of the successful break, has risen high enough in the standings to contend for the overall victory. Stage eleven of the 2010 Giro d’Italia which finished in l’Aquila was a classic fuga di bidone. 54 men escaped at kilometer 20 and by the end of the stage were over twelve minutes ahead of the main field. In that break was journeyman Spanish rider David Arroyo who then became the maglia rosa once the race hit the Dolomites; he put up a tremendous, but ultimately unsuccessful fight to keep the Pink Jersey.

  GC: General Classification.

  General Classification: The ranking of the accumulated time or placings, whichever basis the race uses to determine its winner. Since 1913 both the Giro and the Tour have used time. See Stage Race.

  Giri: Plural of giro.

  Giro d’Italia: A three-week stage race held in Italy, traditionally in May. It was first run in 1909. Often referred to as, simply, the Giro.

  Giudice di Gara: Italian for commissaire.

  GPM: Italian, for Gran Premio della Montagna. In 1933 the both the Giro and the Tour started awarding points for the first riders over certain hard climbs, the winner of the competition being what the English-speaking world calls the King of the Mountains. The classification has lost some of its magic in recent years because of the tactics riders use to win it. Today a rider wishing to win the GPM intentionally loses a large amount of time in the General Classification. Then when the high mountains are climbed, the aspiring King can take off on long breakaways to be first over the mountains without triggering a panicked chase by the GC contenders. The leader of the GPM classification in the Giro wears a green jersey.

  Gran Premio della Montagna: Italian, see GPM.

  Grand Tour: There are three Grand Tours, each lasting three weeks: the Tour de France, the Giro d’Italia and the Vuelta a España.

  Green Jersey: Worn by the leader of the GPM classification.

  Gregario: Italian. Because bicycle racing is a sport contested by teams and won by individuals, a man designated to be the team leader has his teammates work for him. These men have been called domestiques in France and the English-speaking world since Tour founder Henri Desgrange used it as a term of contempt for Maurice Brocco, whom he believed was selling his services to aid other riders in the 1911 Tour. Italians use a word for soldier, gregario. Today the terms have lost any bad connotation and serve as acknowledgements of the true nature of racing tactics. Gregari (plural) will chase down competitors and try to neutralize their efforts, they will protect their team leader from the wind by surrounding him. When a leader has to get a repair or stop to answer nature, his gregari will stay with hi
m and pace him back up to the peloton. They are sometimes called “water carriers” because they are the ones designated to go back to the team car and pick up water bottles and bring them back up to the leader.

  Gregario di lusso: A domestique of such high quality that he could be the captain of his own team. When Herman van Springel, who nearly won the 1968 Tour de France, raced for Eddy Merckx, he was a gregario di lusso.

  Giornata no: Italian. A day in which a racer has no strength or energy. French is un jour sans (a day without).

  Gruppetto: Italian. In the mountains the riders with poor climbing skills ride together hoping to finish in time to beat the time limit. By staying together in a group, they hope that if they don’t finish in time they can persuade the officials to let them stay in the race because so many riders would otherwise be eliminated. It doesn’t always work. Often the group lets a particularly experienced racer who knows how to pace the Grupetto lead them in order to get in just under the wire. This risky strategy minimizes the energy the riders have to expend. The French term is Autobus. The Grupetto is also sometimes called the Laughing Group.

  Gruppo: Italian, literally, “group”. In road racing it is the peloton. When they are all together without any active breakaways, it is gruppo compatto. When referring to the bicycle, gruppo means the core set of components made by a single manufacturer, such as a Campagnolo Gruppo.

  Hilltop finish: When a race ends at the top of a mountain, riders with the greater climbing skills have the advantage. It used to be that the finish line was far from the last climb, allowing the bigger, more powerful riders to use their weight and strength to close the gap to the climbers on the descents and flats.

  Hook: To extend an elbow or thigh in the way of another rider, usually during a sprint, to impede his progress while he is attempting to pass. Often it is said that a rider “threw a hook”.

  Intermediate sprint: To keep the race active there may be places along the race course where the riders will sprint for time bonuses or other prizes (premiums, or primes—pronounced “preems”).

  ITT: Individual time trial. See time trial.

  Jump: A rider with the ability to quickly accelerate his bike is said to have a good “jump”.

  Kermesse: A lap road race much like a criterium but the course can be longer, as long as 10 kilometers.

  King of the Mountains: See GPM.

  KOM: King of the Mountains. See GPM.

  Laughing Group: See Grupetto.

  Maglia rosa: Italian, see Pink Jersey.

  Maglia Iridata: Italian, see Rainbow Jersey.

  Massaggiatore: Italian for soigneur.

  Massed Start Road Race: All the riders start at the same time. This is different from a time trial where the riders are set off individually at regular time intervals.

  Mechanical: A problem with the function of a racer’s bicycle, usually not meaning a flat tire. Sometimes there have been rules in place that prevent a rider’s changing bikes unless a mechanical problem is present; mechanics have then manufactured mechanicals in sometimes successful attempts to fool the judges.

  Minute Man: In a time trial the rider who starts a minute ahead. It’s always a goal in a time trial to try to catch one’s minute man.

  Musette: A cloth bag containing food and drinks handed up to the rider in the feed zone. It has a long strap so the rider can slip his arm through it easily on the fly, then put the strap over his shoulder to carry it while he transfers the food to his jersey pockets.

  Natural or nature break: Because races can take over seven hours, the riders must occasionally dismount to urinate. If the riders are flagrant and take no care to be discreet while they answer the call of nature they can be penalized. Charly Gaul lost the 1957 Giro when he was attacked while taking such a break, so he later learned to urinate while on the fly.

  Off the back: To be dropped.

  Paceline: Riders riding nose to tail saving energy by riding in each other’s slipstream. Usually the front rider does the hard work for a short while, breaking the wind for the others, and then peels off to go to the back so that another rider can take a short stint at the front. The faster the riders go, the greater the energy saving gained by riding in the slipstream of the rider in front. When the action is hot and the group wants to move fast the front man will take a short, high-speed “pull” before dropping off. At lower speeds the time at the front is usually longer. See Echelon.

  Palmarès: French for an athlete’s list of accomplishments.

  Parcours: The race course.

  Partenza: Italian for race start.

  Passista: Italian for rouleur.

  Passista-Scalatore: A rouleur who can climb well, an all-rounder. Generally this is the type of rider who can win a stage race because he can do well on the flats and time trials and not lose time (and may even gain time) in the mountains. Examples: Fausto Coppi, Bernard Hinault, Lance Armstrong, Eddy Merckx, Giovanni Battaglin.

  Passo: Italian for mountain pass. Plural is passi.

  Pavé: French for cobblestone, and in English cycling is used to refer to a cobblestone road. Riding the pavé requires skill and power. Some riders such as the legendary Roger de Vlaeminck seem to almost glide over the stones knowing exactly what line to take to avoid trouble. De Vlaeminck, who won the Paris–Roubaix four times, rarely flatted in this race famous for its terrible cobbles.

  Peloton: The main group of riders traveling together in a race. Breaks leave the front of it, dropped riders exit its rear. Synonyms: bunch, group, field, pack. Italian is plotone.

  Piano: Italian for soft. It can mean slow or easy when riding. In the past, the Giro often had “piano” stages where the riders intentionally took it easy until the final kilometers leading up to the sprint.

  Piazza: Italian. See Podium.

  Pink Jersey: Worn by the rider who is currently leading in the General Classification in the Giro d’Italia. It was chosen because the sponsoring newspaper La Gazzetta dello Sport is printed on pink paper. In 1931 Learco Guerra was first rider to wear the Pink Jersey. Italian is maglia rosa.

  Plotone: Italian for peloton.

  Podium: The top three places, first, second and third. Many racers know that they cannot win a race and thus their ambition is limited to getting on the podium. In major races such as the Tour and the Giro, attaining the podium is such a high accomplishment that it almost makes a racer’s career. Italian is piazza.

  Points: The usual meaning is the accumulation of placings in each stage. The Giro awards the same number of points regardless of the stage’s terrain. The Tour gives more points to the flatter stages so the winner of the points competition is a more likely to be sprinter. See General Classification. In the Giro the Points leader wears a red jersey, in the Tour he dons a green one.

  Prologue: French. An introductory stage in a stage race that is usually a short individual time trial, normally under ten kilometers. The Giro has also used a team time trial format in the prologue.

  Pull: A stint at the front of a paceline.

  Queen Stage: The hardest, most demanding stage of a stage race; it is always in the high mountains. Italian is il tappone.

  Purple Jersey: In the Giro a purple, or more specifically cyclamen, jersey was awarded to the leader of the points competition until 2010.

  Rainbow Jersey: The reigning World Champion in a particular cycling event gets to wear a white jersey with rainbow stripes. The championships for most important events are held in the fall. A former World Champion gets to wear a jersey with rainbow trim on his sleeves and collar. If a World Champion becomes the leader of the Tour, Giro or Vuelta he will trade his Rainbow Jersey for the Leader’s Jersey. Italian is maglia iridata.

  Relegate: Italian and English (pronounced differently, of course) for a judge’s decision to assign a lower place to a rider after a rule infraction. Sprinters
who fail to hold their line in the final meters and endanger the other racers are generally given the last place of their group.

  Rifornimento: Italian for taking on food and drink. Zona Rifornimento is Italian for the feed zone.

  Ritiro: Italian for abandon

  Road furniture: Concrete medians and barriers put in roads to slow traffic. The roads of northern Europe, in particular, are filled with road furniture and it can make bicycle racing there dangerous.

  Rouleur: French for a rider who can turn a big gear with ease over flat roads and is the term most often used in English. Rouleurs are usually bigger riders who often suffer in the mountains. Italian is passista.

  Same time: See “@”.

  Scalatore: Italian for one who climbs well.

  Scattista: Italian for a climber who can explode in the mountains with a devastating acceleration. The most famous and extraordinary of these pure climbers were Charly Gaul and Marco Pantani.

  Soigneur: Today a job with many duties involving the care of the riders: massage, preparing food, handing up musettes in the feed zone and sadly, doping. Usually when a doping scandal erupts the soigneurs are deeply involved. Italian is massaggiatore.

  Sprint: At the end of a race the speeds get ever higher until in the last couple of hundred meters the fastest riders jump out from the peloton in an all-out scramble for the finish line. Teams with very fine sprinting specialists will employ a “lead-out train”. With about five kilometers to go these teams will try to take control of the race by going to the front and stepping up the speed of the race in order to discourage last-minute flyers. Sometimes two or three competing teams will set up parallel pace lines. Usually the team’s train will be a pace line organized in ascending speed of the riders. Each rider takes a pull and peels off; the next rider in line will be a quicker one who can keep increasing the speed. The last man before the team’s designated sprinter is a speedy rider who will end up with a good placing by virtue of being at the front of the race in the final meters and having a good turn of speed himself.