Ep. 582 Giro D'Italia 2021 Stages 14, 15 & 16 | Between Wine And Food By Marc MillonMarc Millon

Italian wine podcast. Chinchin with Italian wine people. Swirl, sniff, sniff, sniff, sip, and one second. Here we go. Swirl, sniff, sip, Smith. What are you saying? Don't forget this testing test. Welcome to this special edition where we talk wines and de Jiro D'italia. We held an exceptional clubhouse room dedicated to Jiro D'italia, but it was not recorded. I know I know, bummer. But anyways, we thought about sharing some notes about the pages of the Jiro written and read by Mark Millen, a food wine and travel writer, and the author of numerous books, as well as magazine articles published on both sides of the Atlantic. Stay tuned. Smith, while you're saying, don't forget these testing tips. The juggernaut that is the Jiro Dicania rolls relentlessly on as we approach some of the most exciting stages in the highest mountains. Here are my reports for stages fourteen, fifteen, and sixteen. Stage fourteen Chitadala to Montez on colon, two hundred and five kilometers. Hope. It's what drives us all on. It's what makes us get up in the morning. Hope is what gets professional cyclists out of bed in the dead of winter, to put in the hard kilometers, to prepare themselves, even just to be able to take part in a grand tour like the giro d'italia. It's what makes them keep riding every day over three weeks when every muscle, sinew, and bone in their body must be aching, and in utter agony. Yesterday's route from Ravenna to Verona, passing through Ferara and Mantua in homage to Dante La Guilleri was a day for most riders just to recuperate and try to recover before the arduous days in the mountains. It could not have been flatter or straighter. It was a day when there was absolutely no hope for a breakaway, a small group of riders to try to get ahead and hold out to the finish. And yet, a trio led by the indefatigable simon Pello, who was proving to be this year's most combative rider, tried all the same. Even when the full might of the Peloton was bearing down on them in the final five kilometers, when it was clearly hopeless to hang out any longer, They still made a final acceleration to try and prolong their moment in the sun for just a little longer. Why? What drove them on when there was absolutely no point whatsoever? Why did they expend precious energy and fatigue their already aching muscles when there was absolutely no benefit to be gained? It seems that hope becomes a habit, a state of mind, so they just drove themselves on. Hopefully. Jacomo Nizolo, the Italian and European champion knows about hope as much as anyone. One of the most popular riders in the Peloton, he's an immensely talented sprinter who so far has been unable to win a stage in his home grand tour, finishing second on countless disappointing occasions. What must have gone through his mind then? At the very end of the stage, when? Having been delivered to the final two kilometers in perfect position by his hardworking Quebec Aso's team, he saw Eduardo Afini of Jumbo Vista accelerated such an astonishing pace for a final dash to glory along the strait, Corso Porta Nueva Verona. It was an audacious move, and Afini was powerful enough to open up a sizable gap that looked almost hopeless to reel in. Did need Zolo at that moment think that he might have to settle for another second? No. He believed in himself because he had hope in his heart. Gradually, then more quickly, almost superhumanly. He pounded after his countrymen. Got back onto his wheel, slipped stream for just a moment, then powered past him arms aloft as he crossed the line and immense relief to take his first stage win in the giro d'italia. Today, we enter a new phase of this three week grand tour. The start line might as well have a banner written above it, the phrase. Carved over the portal when Dante's protagonist and his guide, the poet virgil, begin their descent into hell. If their journey took them down into the deepest bowels of the earth to discover the terrifying circles of inferno, Our journey goes ever upwards. Five of the next eight stages will take the cyclist to some of the highest and most inhospitable mountain top summits in all of Italy. Dante's words might as well be chalked on the high mountain roads, along the famous names of cyclists, past and present, abandoned all hope. Yee, who enter here. Mountains are for many of us, what the giro d'italia is all about. Mountains will decide the victor. Mountains will crush the loser, and the mountains, a rider on a bad day can lose ten minutes, fifteen minutes, twenty minutes or more on GC, this in a race whose outcome is often decided by mere seconds. There will be courageous and repeated attacks on the Malia Rosa. Riders will have to dig their deepest. Teams will have to be at their strongest in support, and many will lose the will to live, might abandon all hope. This is where we will get to know those riders who are great of heart, those riders who never lose hope, even when everything around them seems hopeless. So then, a fatigantly long day with two major climbs, including one of the steepest and most shockingly fearsome of all Monte Zonkolaan located in the Karnic Alps of Fruliva Ezzia, The time is a lake numbing fourteen kilometers and it is steep all the way up. I drove up the road to just below the summit of Montez on Colan two summers ago to seek out the Malga Posov in search of mountain cheese. Every summer, the Gortani family, undertake the Transumanza walking their herd of cattle up old mountain tracks to this remote summit outpost, where they can live and enjoy the fresh and ethereal mountain air. The cows graze happily on the fragrant grass of the high alpeggio and the Gortani's milk them to make a range of mountain cheeses. My plan today is to position myself somewhere just below the Malga on my virtual imagined armchair journey to cheer on the cyclists. Maybe somewhere around where the road rears to a leg numbing twenty seven percent incline. That's one in three. There, they will be going through their own private hell and moving slowly enough to look in their eyes and to see who still has hope or who has abandoned it. Us armchair and cyclists, like nothing more than to see someone else suffering for we've all been there ourselves. It is far too high here for vineyards. So I'll take a bottle in my backpack to enjoy with the hunk of the Malga's fragrant mountain cheese. But what bottle? The vineyards on the foothills leading up to the high mountains, as well as on the plain and on the limestone plateau of the Carso collectively make up one of Italy's most exciting wine regions, Frioli Venezia, Julia. Source of both outstanding whites, as well as great reds. I'm tempted to stash a bottle of isonzo Cabernet in my backpack. In World War one, no less than eleven battles took place along the isonzo. Italy's bloody front line against the Austrians. It would be an apt choice for there are still many battles to come in this year's Jiro D'italia. Frioli suffered in World War two as well. And in centuries of skirmishes and battles before then, a sad history. Much as I enjoy and relish the combat on the road, I'm going to go with a wine that instead of conflict and competition seeks harmony and brotherhood. Vino Delapace from the Cantina Proctor de Cormonte. When this calf cooperative was formed after the war, the wine growers decided to commemorate peace by planting the Vigna Delmundo. With vines brought in from every wine growing continent on earth. Today, the Vigna Delmundo comprises more than eight hundred different grape varieties. Every year, They are harvested and vinified to make the Vino de la pache, a bottle of which is sent to every civil and religious head of state in the world. It is a symbolic wine certainly, but it is also wine to drink, gently sweet, soft, not in the least aggressive or bellicose. Surely, even in the midst of a combative stage race, such as the Jiro Ditania, there is time to take a moment to enjoy this wine of peace. Perhaps sampled with a slice of gubana, a snail shaped pastry filled with nuts and candied fruit and raisened soaked in grappa. The vino de la pache is a unique wine of human solidarity and brotherhood. In this year, more than ever, we all need to take a deep breath. Drink deeply and hold on to our hope. Stage fifteen, grado to gorizia, one hundred and forty seven kilometers. After yesterday's engagement on the high and mighty slopes of Montezon Colan, today's hostilities in the giro d'italia continue over the rolling hills and Autopiano, the Frulevenetia, Julia, and across the border into the Bainsitza of neighboring Slovakia. During world war one, some of the fiercest and most intense fighting took place over the succession of steep limestone hills that ripple to the north of gorizia and Nova Garizia. The same hills over which today's combatants will fight it out for stage fifteen honors. After World War II, the area was subject to a further territorial dispute between Italy and Yugoslavia that resulted in an arbitrary border being drawn that was shut with an iron curtain that divided families and communities. Three times a cyclist will go around a circuit that crosses that border in Europe today that is truly San Frontier. Three times they will climb, Slovenia, Gornier, Cervo, only two kilometers, but painfully steep. Then endure a succession of challenging descents and sharp rises passing through former battlefields that today, across both sides of the border, are covered in manicured vines. There were no vines on the slopes of Montes on colon yesterday, and we couldn't see much of the alpine pastures that herdsmen and their cows so appreciate for their fresh and fragrant grasses that make such sweet milk and cheese. Snow still covered the high slopes, and it was foggy, misty, and miserable at the summit. Lorenzo Fortunato, didn't allow either the thin rarefied air or the cold inhospitable conditions to dampen his spirits, though, as he spun powerfully up the steepest final section to claim a debut judo stage win, both for himself and for the newly formed Iola Komata cycling team, yet another victory for an Italian. Yon Tratnick of Bahrain victorious was happy to finish second, a Slovenia is also looking forward to today's stage that will take him into his home country. If he's not too exhausted from his exertions yesterday, I expect him to be on the attack again. What then of the others? The GC contenders? It looked for much of the final fourteen kilometer climb that Monte Zonkullen itself would be the victor, that its challenging slopes were just too steep and long for anyone to contemplate an aggressive breakaway. And risk blowing up on the highest and steepest slopes, losing their legs and the will to live and so dropping back minutes or more. Only on the final brutally steep section towards a finish did British rider, Simon Yates, finally make a move, steadily riding away from the bunch that had been led first by the Astana team, and then by Ineos Grenadiers in the Marni Rosa, Egon Bernal. Only Bernal could go with him. All the others were dropped. It was great to see Yates who came into the race as one of the hot and informed favorites, and last show his class. But in the end, he could not match Bernal, who imperiously danced on his petals, to break away from Yates and gain further time on all his GC rivals. Stage fifteen starts in Grado, an island town on an Adriatic lagoon. When after the disintegration of the Roman Empire, Maradors came over alps into Italy, first the van doors, then the goths and the lombards. The people of these fertile lands had to take refuge to escape rape and pillage. Grado, a Roman island port on a lagoon in the Adriatic became just such a place of safety. Has also happened on the islands to the south within the Venetian lagoon, which is how Venice came to be created and settled. From Grado, stage fifteen, soon passes Aquilea. Today, a small town on the alluvial plain of the Natizone river. It's hard to imagine that this was once one of the largest and most beautiful of all Roman cities with a population of over one hundred thousand due to its strategic location for roads leading to and from the Eastern Mediterranean, Panonia, and Northern Europe. When atilla, scourge of god and king of the huns, passed through an AD four fifty two, he sacked the city and destroyed it so utterly that it was impossible afterwards, even to recognize the original site. No battles will take place here today. Conflict will only be fully engaged once the riders have passed along the Isonzo and into the wine hills of Colio and its Prada counterpart across the border in Slovenia. After the devastation that the region suffered in the aftermath of two world wars, a collective decision was taken to rebuild the Ferule Venezia Julia wine country by concentrating on quality through the replantation of its most important native grapes, notably for whites, Frulano, ribola Jolla, Pino Gridjo, Lavazia, Eastriana, and for reds, Rifosco Del pedumco Oroo, Scio Petino, and Pignolo, as well as through the introduction of international varieties such as chardonnay, sauvignon blanc, Cabernet franc, Cabernet sauvignon, and Merlo. Today, Freuleven eighty, Julia is without doubt one of Italy's most exciting wine regions primarily for its robust, firm, and clean whites, but also for some outstanding reds. The three times Circuit today will thrice pass through Oslawia, a small wine communion virtually on the Slovenia border. Today, there is no border, and people can pass back and forth freely and unchallenged. Above the town stands a monument that is a reminder to the sad past, the Osario Deoslavia. Constructed on Monte Calvario to house the mortal remains of some fifty seven thousand Italian soldiers who perished during the numerous World War one battles of the Ozzonzo that took place over these peaceful lands. Today, the hills of Osavia that were once a killing field are covered in vines, most notably Ribolajala, which finds a particularly propitious habitat here. My wine choice for today is Yosco Graftner's iconic Anfora, aribonagala, fermented in earthenware, Amfora, buried underground, a method of winemaking that dates back to antiquity and the origins of wine eight thousand years ago. The grapes are macerated on the skins for thirty days, so the result is an orange wine that has structure, tannin, and deeply rich and warm flavors. Amphora is a wine that reminds us all that for centuries and across millennia, wine has always remained a civilizing force for good. Indeed, a cornerstone of our civilization itself. La civilta Delberg. The American novelist Ernest Hemingway, a great wine lover himself, who was stationed on the Isonzo front during World War One, where he served as an ambulance driver, an experience that found its way into one of his most famous novels. For our warriors on two wheels, there will be no farewell to arms until exactly a week today when the judah will finally arrive on the streets of Milan. In the meantime, we continue to ride on and to journey through Italy, wine glass in hand. Stage sixteen, sacile to Cortina Dumpetso, two hundred and twelve kilometers. Today is the day that many Tifosi of the giro d'italia have all been waiting for. The tapone, the queen stage, the Chima Kopi, Without doubt, this is the hardest stage of an already grueling three week grand tour that still has many more mountains to climb. Over a lengthy two hundred and twelve kilometers, the riders will have to ascend an incredible five thousand seven hundred meters over four first category, the hardest mountain tops, three of which soar to more than two thousand meters above sea level. The Paso is this year's Chima Kopi. Awarded to the highest peak on each Jiro named after the legendary post war Italian cycling hero, Fausto Copi, who won the Jiro Italian no less than five times and who was called il campionissimo. The champion of champions. Today will be a hellish stage requiring super powers just to get around it, let alone race to victory. It is a day to strike fear into the hearts and legs of every cyclist who will arrive at the start line this morning. For us lesser mortals who have experienced a suffering, an agony that repeated climbs in high mountains brings, our legs are trembling in anticipation. Perhaps because of today, something of a truce was called in yesterday's stage through the battlefields of Frioli. A large group of breakaways was allowed to build up a substantial lead that could not be reeled back in. And in the end, Victor Campan Arts, a workhorse domestique, usually in the service of others, was given the freedom to be able to ride to a stage victory. It was team Kubekko Asos' third stage win in five days, an absolutely incredible achievement for Africa's first UCI world tour team. Ubuntu said Campanarts at the finish. I am because we are a Naguni bantu term that signifies humanity towards others. The team's string of unexpected stage wins are all the more heart lifting because they ride in support of a South African charity that aims to help young people by supplying them with bicycles. Bicycles changed lives is their motto. The Peloton eventually rolled in some seventeen minutes behind Camponarts and the other breakaways. The situation that Agon Bernal, the Malia Rosa was more than happy with. It was a good day for us. We were in control, able to rest, and begin to think about the queen stage. He set quietly at the finish. Starting in Sacheile, an old and stylish Venetian town just inside Feruli today's route passes through lands that were once part of the Republic of Venice's Tarafirma mainland. The difficulty begins almost from the start with a testing first category climb up La Crosata. It will be interesting to see if any of the teams attempt to attack early on to put pressure on the Malia Rosa and ineos grenadiers or whether breakaways will be allowed to escape once again. Certainly, the Italians will be vying to take the considerable honor and prestige of cresting the Chima Kopi first, as well as those contenders for the Malia Azura King of the mountains. After La Crozetta, come the trio of immense mountains that must be tackled and descended in succession, pass Sophie DIA at two thousand fifty seven meters above sea level. Paso Portoi at two thousand two hundred and thirty nine and Paso Jao at two thousand two hundred and thirty three. Then a frightening fast dangerous, especially if the weather is wet, descent to the finish at the ski resort of Cortina dampetzal. Last year, at the end of February two thousand twenty, we were cross country skiing and tow block, just over the other side, of Cortina Dampetso in the Soultiro. Italy's German speaking autonomous region. We intended to ski up the mountain pass and down the other side into Cortina, but the trails on the Venator side exposed to more sun were closed because of lack of snow. That all seems an absolute lifetime ago. For we were there precisely the moment when a handful of small towns in Veneto and Lombardia, were compelled to go into Europe's first lockdown over an obscure and novel type of virus that no one had ever heard of until then. Though we were concerned at what was happening so close to us, we were still able to enjoy a fabulous week in the high dolomites, skiing through the most magnificent countryside under the dominating and distinctive peaks of the trechime. In the evenings, we soothed our aching limbs in the spa enjoyed feasts of Austrian inspired foods with an Italian accent and drank deeply from a list of sensational, sooty rollese wines made from grapes such as Turner, Tremina, Viceburgunder, for notch and Lagraine. Today's stage takes place just on the other side of those very same mountains in Veneto, one of Italy's greatest wine regions, both in terms of quality, as well as in volume produced. Mountain streams tumble down from the high mountains and feed into mighty rivers. Their rich alluvial soils are a propitious habitat for the vine. Most notably on today's stage, the crosses the Piaveval Valley. So before the giant climbs start, I'm going to first make a detour to the vineyards of Azolo to snatch a bottle or two of a wine that I don't have the chance to sample often Ray Cantina. In eighteen o nine, Franco Italian Forces under Napoleon conquered these lands from the Austro Hungarian. French rule was briefly imposed, and one consequence was that the local wine growers were compelled to crub up their native vines and replant with French grapes like Merlo, Cabernet franc and Cabernet sauvignon varieties that have indeed transplanted well and still thrive on the vineyards of Piave, Montello, and Azolo today. Some had talked in his varieties inevitably were lost. How many no one can say? Ray Cantina is one that somehow managed to survive, but which had almost gone extinct after the damage and devastation of the last World War. Through the efforts of a handful of wine growers, it is now producing a high quality red wine that deserves to be better known and sampled. I visit Oslo every few years, and it brought a bottle from the practical mel winery back with me. And we had it just the other night with dinner, intense, deep purple, blackberries, and plums on the news, rich in acidity, high in canon, and alcohol, with a bitter finish, wine with a certain savaged character that are liked very much. A bowl of paste Fajoli or a plate of duck ragu and polenta, the favorite staple here, and a glass or two of this Ray Cantina. These are foods. This is the wine. To add fortitude to the legs and mind before a fearsome tapa, like today's queen stage, even for those of us following from the comfort of our armchairs. Forza Avante E salute. Swaddle, sniff, sniff, sniff, sip, sip, and a squirrel. One second. Here we go. Swirl, sniff, sip, sniff. What are you saying? Don't forget these testing tips.