For island enthusiasts it is time to get back on the bike. The opportunity already appears on Sunday, in the Sassari area, where Alghero Bike has set up the 1st edition of the “Città di Olmedo” cyclocross Trophy. The race will be valid as the 5th round of the Sardinia Cross Cup 2021-2022, the circuit named after Salvatore Meloni. At the start there will be all the agonistic and amateur categories. The competition will also be valid as a single round of regional championship for the 1st year Beginners and 1st and 2nd year Women Beginners category. The race will start from the municipal field “Luigi Deriu” of via Sardegna and will see the participation of about a hundred runners.
At 10, inside the structure created for baseball, the first start reserved for the 30-minute battery will take place Beginners and students men and women, then space for the 40 ‘for Juniores, Master 4-5-6-7-8 and, to follow, the highlight with the 60 ‘battery reserved for categorie Open, Elite Master Sport, Under 23 e Master 1-2-3.
The route, for everyone, will be about 2300 meters starting on concrete cycle path and numerous artificial and natural obstacles, including the bumps, the crossing of a bridge and the much feared snail, with the athletes in columns and grappling with the mud. present in large quantities.
All the big names in the discipline are expected, eager to dispose of the excesses of the holidays as soon as possible and find the best form in view of the remaining four stages of the circuit.
Export Sardi. On 7 January Sardinia wrote the history of the Masters in the national bicifuoristrada. Andrea Lovicu, Master 3 of the Bike Team Demurtas, has in fact conquered a prestigious second place at the Italian Cyclocross Championships in Basiliano (Udine). The race was won by the multiple champion Carmine Del Riccio but just two laps from the finish, the rider from Barbagia was just 30 ” late and only in the last two laps did he have to hoist the white flag for the final victory. Andrea Lovicu’s, who recently improved the third place two years ago, is the best result ever of a Sardinian athlete at the Italian championships, and goes hand in hand with Cristian Melis’ bronze achieved seven seasons ago.
«During the race I suffered a lot from the cold – tells the runner from Nuoro, who had a past as a road agonist until 2001 in Tuscany – around the clock the climatic conditions changed. It went from ice to mud in an instant“. Thermometer below zero and decidedly complex layout. Ingredients that have not prevented Andrea Lovicu from giving the best of himself. “It was an extremely technical 2500 meters – explains the Italian vice-champion – a very different path from those set up in Sardinia. Many challenging descents to ride and passages in which the difference is the ability to stay on the bike rather than the leg“. Meanwhile, the Nuorese enjoys the success and explains why cyclocross can be born and sometimes reborn, as the very champion Fabio Aru tried to do.
The Sardinian patrol was quite conspicuous among the thousand departures from Friuli arriving from all over Italy. In addition to Andrea Lovicu and precisely Cristian Melis, in Udine there were also the M1 regional champions Eros Piras, the Master 2 Andrea Costanzo and the Master Sport Michael Giua. Remarkable results also came from the young Gabriele Pili and Mirko Pani, who came respectively 13th and 14th after starting from 69th position on the grid with seven heats in front and having made the beauty of over 50 overtaking, including ice, mud and temperatures. below zero. Among the women, applause for Giorgia Secchi, who closed the contest with a remarkable ninth place finish.
