RE: [CR]49Giro 19 May 1949

content-class: urn:content-classes:message
Subject: RE: [CR]49Giro 19 May 1949
Date: Tue, 20 May 2003 15:53:58 -0400
Thread-Topic: [CR]49Giro 19 May 1949
Thread-Index: AcMeVdQfT7+pnDgnQk+Tadb8BvY52QArz8Tw
From: "Silver, Mordecai" <MSilver@iso.com>
To: <classicrendezvous@bikelist.org>

Snipped from Aldo Ross' translation:

"TO DO THE RACE? IT IS WONDERFUL! (transcribed by Aldo Ross)

Palermo, the night of May 19, 1949.

Dino Buzzati writes....

And me, too, for once upon a time, when I was a boy, I raced astride a bicycle whose mudguards I had removed (so it would look a little more like the bikes the champions rode), and I remember how one evening I stuck close to Miss Alfonsina Strada's wheel for two whole laps around the park. Honest!.

After which I exploded, leaving me humiliated, especially when, after Alfonsina shot-off like an arrow, a policeman grabbed me and fined me twenty lire for speeding - an enormous sum of money in those days."
>From http://www.biciveneto.it/riders.htm: "Aptly named Alfonsina Strada (strada means "road"), the only woman ever to participate in the Giro d'Italia, in 1924. The smiling, tenacious farm girl from Modena, wearing number 72, rose to as high as 41st place in the GC (out of 90 riders), in a race whose shortest stage was 250 km. (She also finished last in three stages). After a crash caused her to arrive outside the time limit on one stage, she was officially out of the race, but the officials allowed her to continue anyway and she completed the Giro--quite a feat, because tens of riders had abandoned the race due to illness, injuries, exhaustion, and the harsh conditions."

In more recent times, Beryl Burton more than held her own against men: in 1967 she broke the men's record in the 12-hour time trial. Her record has never since been matched by a woman.

Thanks Aldo, keep up the great work!

Mordecai Silver
NY,NY