Every 19 August, the world marks World Photography Day, commemorating the moment in 1839 when the daguerreotype was presented as a gift “free to the world”. Cycling was built through the pages of newspapers like La Gazzetta dello Sport and the voices of radio commentators before becoming a global spectacle on television and the internet. Yet few sports owe as much to the power of the still image as cycling: without photography, many of its greatest moments would have faded with time.
The Giro d’Italia has the privilege of telling its story through the lenses of the best artists in the world. Its photographers rise before the peloton, wait patiently for hours in the rain on a Dolomite hairpin, or shoot from the back of a motorbike, just metres from the riders, capturing the split second in which history is made. The Maglia Rosa billowing in the wind, the dust and sea spray surrounding a breakaway, the embrace at the finish line, the silent disappointment of defeat: thanks to their work, these fleeting moments become timeless.
Today, words can step aside. Let their photographs tell the story. ‘Grazie, fotografi’.
