6th Giro d'Italia 1914 (Italy)

In a Troubled World the 1st 'Timed' Giro Happened, Calzolari Dominates

The winds of World War 1 were swirling at the start of the 1914 Giro d'Italia. This would be the final Giro until 1919.

This year’s Giro saw the General Classification change from a “stage finish points system” to a GC based on accumulated time.

This Giro (like the TdF in 1904) was to be known for:

Only eight of the original eighty-one riders at the start finished the race.

Despite a two-stage blitz by Giuseppe Azzini, a cunning Alfonzo Calzolari of the Team Stucchi dominated in the first “timed” Giro d'Italia General Classification.

SPECIAL NOTE: This Giro is remembered as an extremely hard race. There were five stages of over 400 km (and the longest ever average “stage length”), it included the longest stage ever in the history of the Giro: the 430 km from Lucca to Rome. Costante Girardengo won the stage.

Teams:

There were ten teams that competed in the race:

Race Highlights:

This edition of the Giro was:

Race Summary:

Stage 1: (Saturday, May 24, 1914) The race itself began May 24, 1914 at midnight. Team Ganna’s Angelo Gremo won the stage ahead of Carlo Durando and Alfonso Calzolari who finished +13’55” behind. After those three finishers, thirty-four more crossed the line with the last rider finishing 7 hours after Calzolari. Only three aspiranti (amateur) riders finished the stage.

Stage 6: (Wednesday, June 3, 1914) The sixth stage (from Bari to L'Aquila) the hardest stage in the history of the Giro. Riders abandoned the race including the GC leader Giuseppe Azzini, who was found the next day resting in a country house along the race route. Luigi Lucotti (Ita) won the brutal stage, and Alfonzo Calzolari retook the overall lead.

Stage 8: (Sunday, June 7, 1914) The finial stage, 420 km from Lugo to Milan, Pierino Albini won the stage, ahead of Clemente Canepari and Carlo Durando. Stucchi-Dunlop’s Alfonzo Calzolari crossed the finish line in Milan to gain the 1914 Giro d’Italia victory.

SPECIAL NOTE: The race route compared to the previous editions featured fewer stages (eight) and a longer total race distance (from 2,932 km to 3,160 km). The route covered the whole stretch of the country from northwest to southeast in Bari.

SPECIAL NOTE: Race director Armando Cougnet abandoned the points system for calculating the General Classification. The GC was now a time-based race, where the leader was the rider with the lowest total time raced on all stages. This was a decision the Tour de France director Henri Desgrange made in 1913.

Post-Race Notes:

The race is regarded as the hardest Grand Tour of all time. The route featured the longest average stage length at 395.25 km, the longest individual stage which was stage five covering 430 km (267 mi) from Lucca to Rome, the smallest number of finishers at 8 riders, the highest percentage of retirements at 90%, and the longest individual stage time at 19h34’47” (which was the sixth stage from Bari-L’Aquila).

SPECIAL NOTE: Due to the race's brutal reputation, British author Tim Moore rode the route in autumn of 2012. Moore elected to ride the course in period attire and on a period bicycle. He then published a book where he detailed his exploits entitled Gironimo: Riding the Very Terrible 1914 Tour of Italy.

Controversy after the Finish: the Giro organization declared Alfonzo Calzolari winner of the race. The specifics of the dispute were that during the race Calzolari, Canepari and Durando were given a penalty of 3 hours for getting help from a car. Following a review, the Italian Cycling Union insisted that the race officials had made an error, and the three cyclists should have been disqualified and removed from the race’s GC, which made Pierino Albini (Globo-Dunlop) the winner. The Giro organization did not agree and declared that Calzolari would stay the winner.
A legal battle ensued between the Giro organization and the Italian Cycling Union. The two parties went to court and in February 1915 the Giro organization won the court decision. A court appeal late that year, in July 1915, was denied and Calzolari finally became the definitive winner.
Of the final eight riders the two cyclists without a team, Enrico Sala rode the race as a professional Italian Individual (Isolati) and 19-year-old Umberto Ripamonti as an Italian: Amateur (Aspirante).

SPECIAL NOTE: The scheduled 1915 Giro race had to be cancelled because of Italy’s entry into WW1.

General Classification:

GdI 1919

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