L’Intrepida: an Annual Vintage Bike Race in Anghiari
The culture of cycling in Tuscany. An interview with Fabrizio Graziotti, President of L’Intrepida
October 15, 2017, sixth edition of L’Intrepida. What are the cultural proposals for the participants in this edition?
The event will start on the 14th October and will include an evening in the Anghiari’s theatre dedicated to cycling and culture. On Saturday people can visit museums in Anghiari as well as the Busatti weaving establishment. This year there is something new in the cultural program, a trip to the nearby Pieve Santo Stefano to visit the Piccolo Museo del Diario and to Caprese Michelangelo to see the birthplace of Michelangelo Buonarroti. The program is yet to be finalised but these innovations should culturally enrich the cycling weekend.
In the 2016 edition there were 725 participants. What is the goal for 2017?
Our goal and our dream is to reach 1000 members. I do not know if we’ll make it this year but the aim is 1000 participants and no more than that. We choose to have no more than 1000 competitors because L’Intrepida is based on quality, not quantity. We like to welcome the cyclists, give them a 360 ° experience in Anghiari and in the region, and to keep standards high. People have to return home happy, in love with Anghiari and satisfied with this weekend in Valtiberina (the Tiber River Valley), the memory Valley.
What is the secret behind the organization of L’Intrepida? This is the sixth edition and L’Intrepida is the second well known vintage bike race in Italy. Why?
The secret is a unique combination of professionalism, passion and love for cycling. And there is Anghiari, one of the most beautiful towns in Italy, which, every year, welcomes all the participants of L’Intrepida for a weekend. The vintage bike race crosses 6 towns, 2 provinces, medieval castles and very beautiful places. This is an incredible landscape where, for a weekend, time stops and everything returns to the 1950s: in this spirit the visitors can taste great food and wine, visit museums, and devote themselves to cycling. But the most important secret is the team: we are a group of cyclists, but, before being a group of sportspeople, we are friends. A group of friends who have fun together. That’s the real secret: the community and the sense of sharing.
Fabrizio Graziotti, would you ever have thought that in just 5 editions L’Intrepida would have become such an important, well known and beautiful event?
Really, I did not expect this great success even though I had hoped for it from the very beginning. The idea was born in 2005/2006 and then we waited for some years to start the adventure. The first edition was in 2012 and it has been a great success with more than 200 participants. We strongly believe in the project, and are really proud to be classified as Italy’s second vintage bike race despite the fact that, in recent years, there have been many cycling events. So, let’s continue working with passion and devotion, and I think that this edition of L’Intrepida could achieve other important results. We’re organizing everything, waiting for October to welcome people to Anghiari. Don’t miss L’Intrepida: we look forward to seeing you!
A big thank you to Daniele Gigli, a passionate journalist devoted to this amazing vintage bike race, who helped me interview the President, Fabrizio Graziotti, for this article.
You can join L’Intrepida and meet its Tuscan crew: http://en.memoryroute.org/plan-your-route/
This work was made possible also thanks to the amazing help in proofreading by Ann Game, Emeritus Professor @ School of Social Sciences, University of New South Wales Sydney, Australia.
Blog: www.livinginrelation.com
