The Giro dItalia is my favorite Grand Tour by some distance. I love the Italianness of it, the slightly chaotic feel that pervades it, the often brutal climbs and grueling days and the weather that always seems to be quite content to come along and dump a hefty load of misery on the peloton too, all satisfying my sadistic undertones.Who can ever forget Andy Hampsten and Erik Breukinks almighty ding-dong of a battle up the old Gavia back in 1988 on the stage from Chiesa to Bormio? I didnt even actually see it (English TV back then just about scraped enough gusto for cycling together to show half an hour of the Tour in July), but I feel like I did, having read and written about it since.Hampsten back in 1988 That was one of the iconic Grand Tour stages of the modern era, symbolizing all that is great about this dog-eared sport. In Hampsten, who went on to lose that day to Breukink but win the Giro overall, we had one of the few clean (as well as we can possibly know) riders to have won a Grand Tour in the past well, ever. And how can you talk about the Giro without the tifosi? An Italian cycling fan is just about as passionate a lover of this sport as you are likely to find anywhere and, as ever, theyll be out in droves during this years race.Ah, those tifosi! A Grand Tour is a curious thing. For the...
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