Caserta, and specifically its hamlet of Ercole, will remember the passing of Fausto Coppi, the supreme cycling champion, with a dedicated Mass, on the 65th anniversary of his death that occurred on January 2, 1960.

The religious ceremony will be celebrated, according to a tradition now elevated to a ritual, in the private Madonna della Libera Chapel in Michitto alley in Ercole di Caserta, Thursday, January 2 at 10 am, and will be officiated by Father Pierangelo Marchi. The event promoted by the Cultural Amateur Sports Association "Friends of Fausto Coppi" of Caserta, chaired by Renato Iaselli, with the fundamental collaboration of CONI Caserta led by Michele De Simone and the precious support of historical cycling enthusiasts from Terra di Lavoro - from Amedeo Marzaioli to Pasquale Ventriglia, from Biagio Pascarella to Pietro Delli Paoli - will illuminate on January 2 that well-known sentimental correspondence that was created between Fausto Coppi and Ercole di Caserta, and Campania in a broad sense, upon returning home from the African campaign, in the early post-war period, by that cyclist who had also won the last Giro d'Italia and set the hour record at 'Vigorelli' in '42.

And from December '44, when he was welcomed in the RAF camp of Ercole, as a collaborating orderly for the English lieutenant Smith, at Palazzo Antonucci headquarters, a stone's throw from the church where he will be remembered, and until spring '45, he will spend the short and long time of returning to a normal life and in parallel to that beloved cycling. Fausto Coppi, middle name Angelo, born in Castellania, a village of 84 souls, in the province of Alessandria in September 1919, certainly.

And reborn, as he used to tell, and always grateful, to Ercole di Caserta, exactly eighty years ago these days.