He was an excellent cyclist, a domestique, but also a good leader when needed. We speak in the past tense because today Claudio Michelotto has passed away, from Roverè della Luna, on the border between Trento and Bolzano provinces, which led the unforgettable Adriano De Zan to define him in a RAI broadcast as the "lunar cyclist".

June 8, 1971, the lunar cyclist rides in the pink jersey in the stage from Lienz to Falcade, 195 kilometers with Tre Croci Pass, Falzarego, Pordoi and Valles Pass to climb. Michelotto has been in pink for ten days and starts again with the leader's jersey and 1 minute and 22 seconds ahead of the "old" Aldo Moser (who wore the jersey for a day in that Giro) and two minutes ahead of Gosta Petterson. Gimondi was furious about accusations of wanting to attack Michelotto on the Grossglockner.

Michelotto rides for Scic, Gimondi for Salvarani, Petterson for Ferretti. All modular kitchen brands. The stage, for Michelotto - still in the pink jersey four days from the end of the Giro - is a calvary. At the end of the race, he is stammering from shock, bleeding from a fall on the descent from Valles. He would say at the finish: "This is life. I didn't sleep, I was feeling bad since morning, a puncture caused the tumble. I had just started the last descent, was pushing hard, these are the roads of my home. My rear tubular went flat, the bicycle swerved like crazy, I flew onto the asphalt, rolled down about twenty meters. I was bleeding a lot, I tied a handkerchief roughly, continued almost in a 'trance'. But the frame was bent, the brakes weren't working well, in every turn I was forced to drag my feet on the ground. I changed bicycles, in the last kilometers I almost didn't feel pain anymore, I only felt the blood running down my face. Then I ran out of strength, I didn't understand anything else..." The lunar cyclist said nothing more.