"I've paid everything in advance," Fausto Coppi told him. "And every lira earned is a pedal stroke." Enzo Biagi met the Champion in Sestriere in 1959. "It was his last season. He was about to turn forty, and a reporter had already called him 'grandpa'. But he continued to respect athletes' rules and good habits: rare steak, cooked fruit, wheat germs, mineral water".

The snapshot is on page 141 of "Encounters and Farewells" (Rizzoli, 1992, rediscovered in a book crossing), an autobiographical book where personal stories "only serve as a backdrop to others' lives". Biagi dedicated barely two pages to Coppi, but that encounter, which was simultaneously a farewell, was memorable, without concessions, without tributes, without restraint. And people still talk about Coppi, even during these alpine days of the Tour de France.

"We had breakfast in Sestriere," Biagi wrote, "Giulia Occhini was there, and Flora Lillo, a soubrette who at that moment was with Mike Bongiorno. Giulia Occhini didn't seem very diplomatic; during the conversation she said: 'All actresses are whores', and Flora Lillo, quickly: 'However, so are some ladies'." Giulia, the White Lady, was not a friend, not even a close friend, but his wife. And Flora was an actress: on TV in the program "Red and Black" with Corrado, in the Lieutenant Sheridan series, in the "Anna Karenina" drama, in theater with Macario and Nino Taranto, in cinema with Amedeo Nazzari.

"Fausto spoke softly, politely, he was kind and calm; thin, shy, solitary, he didn't provoke strong impressions". Shy, but he knew how to confide, explain, tell his story, even to Biagi. "They say I've been very lucky, and maybe they envy me. Perhaps, but many times I think how nice it would have been if I had stayed in Castellania, with my father and Serse, working the fields. I was born a farmer, certain things wouldn't have happened, you can be happy with little money, it doesn't matter to have your name in the newspapers". Biagi insisted: "Not even in his family was there much understanding; his mother called him 'the gypsy' and on the day Serse fell, his wife (Bruna Ciampolini, ed) told him: 'You'll meet the same end'. He had given up his youth".

The curiosities sometimes seem always the same: "I asked him what was needed to become a champion: 'Know how to suffer, know how to resist when heat and dust suffocate you, when you're torn by exhaustion and despair, when you're alone and defeated'".

These were the final flames. Coppi traveled and pedaled seeking engagements. "They had offered him two hundred thousand francs per evening, for many months, just to race, as Robic had done, in a French circus: 'It's about your dignity,' Mrs. Occhini intervened, 'you couldn't bear this humiliation'. 'But Giulia,' Coppi said calmly, 'I'm just a bicycle racer, and if they pay me well, why shouldn't I? It's my job and I have children'".

The encounter's ending would not be what Coppi had anticipated: "I'll look for young riders, I'll be a sports director. I'll take care of those who have never won, those who struggle to find a bicycle and a set of tubulars. There are those who race just to eat, only to eat. Even the old controversies have died down. With Bartali we're friends, we enjoy seeing each other. And I'll think about raising my son Angelo Fausto, he has my character: he's stubborn. Perhaps, you understand, he's spoiled. His mother can't say no to him. But he's good, Fausto".