S9 Ep63: Kilometre 0 – Alfredo, Forever
The Cycling Podcast
The Cycling Podcast
4.7 • 3K Ratings
🗓️ 21 May 2021
⏱️ 25 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
Martini is the lesser known of the pair but there is no doubting his status as a national sporting treasure, less for the six rainbow jerseys he amassed as the Italian team coach from 1975 to 1997 than for who he was and how he led his life.
Just a couple of hours before the Giro passed, we made our own pilgrimage to his home – and the house in which he lived – in Sesto Fiorentino.
Kilometre 0 by The Cycling Podcast, supported by Supersapiens.
Transcript
Click on a timestamp to play from that location
| 0:00.0 | Music |
| 0:12.0 | You are listening to Kilometer Zero by the cycling podcast |
| 0:18.0 | Powered by Super Sabians |
| 0:21.0 | Energy Management for committed athletes and coaches |
| 0:25.0 | With some flippancy and inspired by a comment from Gina Maida's audio diary, |
| 0:32.0 | the cycling podcast had already anointed a cycling pope at this Jiro d'Italia, |
| 0:37.0 | only for Micae Landa to be defraught, or at least derailed by a terrible crash |
| 0:41.0 | and early withdrawal the very next day. |
| 0:44.0 | But truthfully, the pope of Italian cycling at least, so he was sometimes called, |
| 0:48.0 | died in September 2014. |
| 0:50.0 | He was 93 and would have celebrated his 100th birthday in 2021. |
| 0:55.0 | His name was Alfredo Martini, and on Thursday the Jiro d'Italia passed through his hometown |
| 1:00.0 | of Sesto Fiorentino, as a tribute to his achievements, his legacy, |
| 1:04.0 | and to the innumerable ways he touched and in some cases shaped lives through the medium of the bicycle, |
| 1:09.0 | which Martini once said should win the Nobel Peace Prize. |
| 1:24.0 | The center of a modest family and a father working long shifts in the Gironi porcelain works, |
| 1:29.0 | Martini started cycling at the age of eight on a racing bike bought for him |
| 1:33.0 | with two months of his father's wages. |
| 1:36.0 | He began watching races then competing in them against the fledgling Tuscan for the Classet Gino Battali. |
| 1:43.0 | Martini was no battali, but looked en route for a solid career, |
| 1:47.0 | until his progress was halted by the Second World War. |
| 1:50.0 | From died in the wall, socialist stock, and a stronghold in the red belt of Central Italy, |
... |
Please login to see the full transcript.
Disclaimer: The podcast and artwork embedded on this page are from The Cycling Podcast, and are the property of its owner and not affiliated with or endorsed by Tapesearch.
Generated transcripts are the property of The Cycling Podcast and are distributed freely under the Fair Use doctrine. Transcripts generated by Tapesearch are not guaranteed to be accurate.
Copyright © Tapesearch 2026.