21 Cycling Climbs Part Two - Flipbook - Page 146
Passo Stelvio
Body text
1.
Hotshot racers and weekend warriors buzz like
little angry wasps up and down the Stelvio
looking for substance or satisfaction and finding
none.
3.
Forty-eight bends, all different, not one the
same.
Steep cambers between hard stone and rigid
battlement walls.
In amongst it all, boys and girls on bicycles
quietly concentrate, stick to their task, hold
their cadence, rhythm, and belief.
Overweight German motorcyclists on Harley
Davidsons struggle to manoeuvre 360-degree
bends and stay upright - but fail.
Climbing this mountain doesn’t mean anything
unless you do it with your own efforts, under
your own power.
Meanwhile, old hipsters freeze to death in
open-top Porsches trying to look cool.
Real men and women ride bicycles.
This is the Stelvio, welcome.
2.
The Stelvio is military.
Straight back, heavy boots marching in step up
a black hard, unforgiving road.
Strong men built this road, muscles bulging,
orders given, orders taken, precise, disciplined,
impeccable, definite.
Limitations set, adhered to, relished even. An
arduous but accepted task.
This road has stood the test of time.
Nothing else will suffice.
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