The ghost of Marco Pantani has been everywhere during the first week of the Giro d'Italia, raising uncomfortable questions over his tainted legacy.
Aspiring legend Tadej Pogačar is in the leader's Maglia Rosa and displaying the pre-race dominance most expected and many feared would turn the first grand tour of the season into a three-week long procession.He did so with all the panache befitting one of the greats of the sport.With 11km to go, just before the ascent of the final climb, Pogačar suffered a front tyre puncture and crashed in front of his team car.
It was a ride with unerring parallels to one of the most famous moments in the race's history, that spoke to cycling's obsession with its romanticised past.Bald, tiny and uniquely flamboyant with a bandana, hooped earrings and a goatie, Pantani was one of the sport's greatest ever climbers, gliding up the side of some of the most demanding mountains with a seeming disregard to the repercussions of failure.
That was the last year before Lance Armstrong artificially powered himself to seven straight yellow jerseys — a fact that should provoke appropriate levels of disbelief in any athletic feats of the era. Undeterred, Pantani passed 49 riders in a pique of adrenaline-fuelled ferocity to claim stage victory and continue his domination of the race.
Pantani subsequently was dragged through the courts, his cycling career spiralling into disappointment, albeit with two more victories in grand tours, including the mythical Mont Ventoux in the 2000 Tour de France. Journalists are already salivating over the prospect of Pogačar completing the elusive Giro-Tour double, romance-filled hearts yearning for a moment of cycling immortality, while cool heads scream caution.
Tadej Pogacar Giro Giro D'italia
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