The wedding. The return home. The departure. Elia Viviani, foster father of the blue track and guardian angel of the city Villa, looks beyond the winter and charts its course towards Paris 2024On the one hand showing a desire for redemption, on the other defending choices that took him away from the arrival ordersThe very clear sense is that the track and the Olympic goal come first.
«I've always said that if I returned to the Ineos there was a reason – he explains – and it was the Olympic project. I signed a three-year contract, I'm sacrificing something on the road because maybe you won't see me in some races, like this year's Giro and let's see the next one, but It's clear that I have the Olympics in my head».
Meanwhile, the blue track is growing…
It's a beautiful reality. Even in speed it has been demonstrated that by forming a group, therefore not simply putting together individuals, but giving him the support of Quaranta, great strides have been made in a very short timeThe higher you go, the more difficult it will be to grow, but in the meantime, we're off to a good start. The boys and girls have already come close to winning some medals, so the group is beautiful and very strong.
Do you feel this creature is yours?
Yes, absolutely and I'm proud of it, of courseWhen I see everything working, of course it's great. At the last World Championships, the men's quartet lost by a hair, but that's okay. The girls showed the superiority that we had been seeing in prospect for years and doing it a year and a half after Paris is certainly a strong signal.
Will you also participate in the Olympic qualifiers?
Yes, I'll do my part too. I'll make sure of the European Championships and then maybe one if not two World Cups out of three. And then the world championships which give double scores, so they will be a fundamental step towards qualification.
How will the World Championships in August, with all the disciplines, affect the season?
It's better for us. As you saw with the Olympics, we have an advantage over nations like Australia and New Zealand. We were suffering when the World Cup was in February, so now that it's in August it's a point of advantage for us.October or August is good for us. Either in the middle of the road season or at the end, when you still have some energy to spend.
But someone will find themselves doing double duty on the track and on the road in just a few days' time…
That can definitely be a problem, in the sense that It's a bit questionable to put them all together. Not only for road and track, but for mountain biking and for everyone, because Van der Poel and Pidcock will have the same problem and so… I don't know, in my opinion this super world championship thing needs to be reviewed, because it could be a “cool to sell” event, but on an athletic level it penalizes multidisciplinarity a lot, After all the years we've spent convincing athletes and teams, it'll be a challenge to match road and track. And perhaps even time trials, which are already more similar to track, but it obviously requires specific preparation. La Guazzini and Pippo (Ganna, ed.) are riders who will have to do both events, Safe.
You'll be competing in the European Championships in February. Does that mean you've started training much earlier?
Yes, we need to anticipate, in the sense that we have little time to meet to fine-tune them, being the first Olympic qualifying test. Above all, anticipate the quality of the work. So it means that You will often see us on the track in Montichiari around Christmas, that we will still be there in early January, before going some to San Juan and some to Australia and go back to your place, because then there won't be any more time. I will start in Argentina with the teamThere was also the possibility of Australia, but it will be Argentina 99 percent.
