A circle that closes. And there could hardly have been a more meaningful place. Nairo Quintana has chosen the Giro dell'Emilia Granarolo to race in the final event of his professional career. On Saturday, October 3rd, the Colombian champion of Movistar Team will start from Ferrara to face for the last time the roads of a race to which he is bound by a truly special relationship.

Fourteen years ago, in fact, the Giro dell'Emilia represented one of Quintana's first major international achievements and his first victory in Italy. It was October 6, 2012: the young Colombian, in his first season with Movistar, conquered San Luca showcasing those extraordinary climbing qualities that in the following years would lead him to the top of world cycling. That victory was one of the first chapters of a career that would make Quintana one of the most important South American riders in cycling history.

Born in 1990 in the mountains of Boyacá, Colombia, Quintana made his name in Europe by winning the Tour de l'Avenir in 2010. Two years later came his move to Movistar and immediate success, with victories at the Vuelta a Murcia and the Route du Sud, a stage at the Critérium du Dauphiné and, of course, the Giro dell'Emilia.

His definitive entry into the elite came at the 2013 Tour de France. At just 23 years old, Quintana finished the Grande Boucle in second place, also winning a stage, the white jersey for best young rider and the polka dot jersey for best climber. He would return to the Tour podium two more times: second in 2015 and third in 2016.

But it is especially two races that definitively consecrated the Colombian. In 2014 he won the Giro d'Italia, becoming the first Colombian and the first South American to win the Corsa Rosa. He took the pink jersey after the famous Val Martello stage and carried it all the way to the final finish in Trieste.

Two years later came the second Grand Tour of his career: the 2016 Vuelta a España, won ahead of Chris Froome. A success that allowed him to complete a most prestigious collection of podiums in all three Grand Tours.

His palmares also includes victories in some of the most important stage races on the world calendar: two Tirreno-Adriatico, the Tour de Romandie, the Volta a Catalunya, the Tour of the Basque Country, along with numerous stage wins in the three Grand Tours.

A sporting story built especially in the mountains, terrain on which the small Colombian climber became for over a decade one of the most recognizable and beloved riders in the peloton.

Quintana had announced last March that 2026 would be his final year as a professional. Even in his farewell season he managed to return to victory, winning a stage of the Vuelta Asturias in April, his first success in four years.

And for his last day in the peloton he chose to return to where, in a sense, his great story with Italian cycling began. «It's a special race for me, because I've won many races in Italy, but this was the first one. I have great affection for Italy and a wonderful relationship with the Italian public. That's why we chose this race to close my career», Quintana explained in recent days.

He will do so wearing the Movistar Team jersey, the same one with which he won the Giro dell'Emilia in 2012 and with which he lived many of the most important moments of his career.