115 meters to go

Giro d'Italia - part one

For two hours, sweaty and thirsty, you watch the 125 meters to go mark on your left, the 100 meters to go on your right. On your left the road has no end, it must come somewhere from the coast. On the right, you detect the finish line far far away. 115 meters, are they kidding? You extend your neck to see it - never have 115 meters looked so distant. And still for them it will be one part in one and a half thousand of today's 176 km stage, six seconds only. The six seconds on which everything depends, the triumph and the fall.

For two hours you wait, like a hungry child you extend your hand begging for stupid gadgets that you will later throw away, you feel part of a big circus, you are embarrassed of being such a blatant and easy target for advertising. For two hours you fight for the place you found, there, at 115 meters to go, with screaming people on your left and screaming people on your right. Turn left, turn right, you see nothing. Only in front of you, behind the fence, you see an empty piece of road that is so dear to you.

And then they come, and they stop in front of you. They don't move from left to right, they are not a video - they stop in front of you, for a few tenths of a second they stop in front of you to let you paint the image in your mind and keep it forever.

In that image you see two jet fighters, one behind the other, one model Cavendish, the other jet named Petacchi, escorted by other jets behind just watching the fight; in that image there are two hounds, one behind the other, one called Mark, the other Alessandro, escorted by a pack of dogs behind them watching the hunting scene.

Who is the hunter? Who is the hunted? The one ahead has his eyes fixed on that finish line 115 meters away, so far and still only six seconds away, six never-ending seconds. The one behind has his eyes on the other, he can't let him go, he only has six seconds of time, six seconds that are running away too fast. And the others behind, they suffer and watch the two ahead of them, mere human spectators to a contest of gods.

That image lasts only a tiny fraction of those long seconds, you are not permitted to see more. While those human spectators to the contest of gods effortlessly and silently move from left to right in front of you, a screeching voice somewhere in the sky yells "Cavendish... Cavendish... Mark Cavendish!".



(Mark Cavendish on the left, Alessandro Petacchi on the right. From: www.bettiniphoto.net)