Time is a tyrant, but so is space. In fact, the two are accomplices: time saturates space. And with Covid or summer, comes the moment of spring cleaning. You start by aiming to clear the attic, you settle for liquidating a box. And among bags, folders and files, indispensable clippings emerge. Like this article of mine on Imerio Massignan: "La Gazzetta dello Sport", July 4, 2003.

He says that "I saw them a moment after I was born, and from that day on they never stopped watching me, and I couldn't resist the temptation to climb on them". He says that "then, whether flat or uphill, on foot or by bike, my legs would turn the same way". He says it was "a gift of nature". And he also says that "for the best climber there was no green jersey or polka dots, there was only your name in the newspaper". In 1960 and 1961, at the Tour, that name was: Imerio Massignan. "But you know, the French: they would sweeten my name to Merì and transform my surname into D'Artagnan. Maybe it was because I needed just a little to feel like attacking".

And Massignan attacks like this: "I loved racing at the Tour so much. Those were the years of national teams, not the blue jersey but the tricolor, each of us felt like, on our skin, an Italian champion. In '60 the coach was Alfredo Binda: he would tell me 'run your own race', but when Nencini took the yellow jersey on the first mountain stage, in the Pyrenees, my race became his. So I had to stay still, I couldn't attack, at most I could join some breakaway but without pulling. We won overwhelmingly: Nencini first, Battistini second, Pambianco seventh, me tenth and first in the mountain points. In '61 the coach was Antonio Covolo: he was obsessed with Carlesi, our team was weaker, the opponents were named Anquetil, Gaul, Darrigade and Stablinski, and I was betting everything on one stage, the one from Toulouse to Superbagnères, more than 200 km and three climbs, uphill finish. I dreamed about it at night".

During the day, that day, July 11, from Toulouse to Superbagnères it wasn't like in the dream. "From the start there's a smell of battle. But there's no battle, only the smell remains, and it's a smell made of heat and flies, restless: sky and clouds, rain and sun, chestnuts and beeches, the black Pyrenees. The first climb: Col des Ares. A quick one: I win it. Still a smell of battle, but the battle isn't here yet, and only the smell remains, and it's a smell made of forests, Spain and civil guards. The second climb: Col du Portillon. A quick one: I drop Junkermann and Gaul, and I win. They come back to catch me. Descent to Luchon, then the final climb, from 600 meters to 1800. It's an elimination race, the others fall behind, at some point I fall behind too, but ahead. Alone. The higher you climb, the harder the wind blows. At the top the trees shake, the stands tremble, the signs disappear, the banner takes off. I don't even know where I am anymore, I'm afraid I've taken the wrong road, and only when Covolo jumps on me do I understand that I've won". Hands on the handlebars so as not to fly away.

On the podium, in the storm, Merì D'Artagnan was moved to tears: "Victory, a rare commodity". Merì D'Artagnan was also moved to tears in Paris, at the Parc des Princes, fourth in the general classification and first in the mountain points: "Fifty thousand spectators, flowers and kisses, national anthem and goosebumps". You can understand him, Merì D'Artagnan: "My father who wore out his arms loading sand for the foundries, my mother who lost fingers and eyes in a cotton mill, and at home there were six of us children to raise on milk and black bread, polenta and onions". "The first year as a professional I finished the Giro without knowing I had one leg, the right one, one centimeter shorter than the left, and to get all the way to Milan every evening they would give me compresses of egg whites". "Wine compresses, I've always done those myself, before, during and after my professional years. After all, no smoking, no hard liquor, no fried food". "No sex? Once, at Legnano, I wrote the expense note: so much for restaurants and trattorias, so much for the train and, at the end, specifying 'since man is not made of wood', I added 10,000 lire without a receipt. Pavesi, the Legnano sports director, widened his eyes, took the pipe out of his mouth, looked at me, put the pipe back in his mouth and signed". "In a sprint I was stationary. If there were 10 of us, I'd finish tenth. Then I worked hard and improved. If there were 10 of us, I'd beat one or two". "The concerts of cicadas, riders collapsing from the heat, thirst crises, washing arms and legs with gasoline to scrape the tar off: those were my Tours de France".