Visas and Re-visas

Jovanotti's journey with "Grillo" Bettini and "Benna" Bennati
on the Moloch dear to Brera, Raschi, Fossati and… Mario Schifano!

From time to time, sitting in the press room at the place that best suited him for the light, the convenience of the various support services, the tranquility necessary for concentration...; from time to time – as written above – Mario Fossati (1922-2013), narrator for Gazzetta, Giorno and Repubblica, spoke of his narrow escape from death in the Russian campaign and peppered his live accounts as well as his sports reports with "canned" phrases. 

Almost furtively, he would extract from some pocket of his trousers or jacket a small book in which, over time, he had jotted down words that evoked fleeting moments, deeds to be dusted off, names "distorted" for the reader's use at a very specific moment in his story. If Bruno Raschi was the "Divine One," capable of writing entire pages of typescript without the slightest correction and without ever removing the sheet of paper from the typewriter, Mario Fossati portrayed the craftsman of the image of that precise moment destined to be revived some time later.

We have not had the fortune of living often next to Gianni Brera except for a fleeting appearance at a sporting event, but we knew well and often frequented that Gianni Mura who had proclaimed himself Brera's heir by promulgating, especially in Repubblica, that Brerism He would have liked to embody this role as editor of Gazzetta, but no publisher ever offered him the opportunity. A role so often dreamed of, yet always too large for a second-rate poet. 

Now that the 2025 Tour de France has slipped into the archives under the banner of Tadej Pogacar—who else?—those figures flash before our eyes, just like that of Luigi Gianoli: a synthesis of spontaneous, effortless, and extreme skill.

But Mario Fossati is the most interesting in the still image. He and his Fausto “Fostò” Coppi from the book printed by the Assayer which brings the Grande Boucle – the Tour route like a Big Curl of hair – of 1952 to life. There it digs into the depths of the gorges that lead to the mountains capable of putting everyone in their rightful place because the climb does not allow for bluffs like the plains, because the mountain in cycling is something very different from a hill more than 600 meters high as geography teaches us in elementary school.

The Mountain begins with "M" as in Moloch, the deity of a life discipline to which one must bow. And it was the Mountain that exalted Fossati as a prose writer, just as it did Brera, Raschi, and Gianoli.

In short: combine the mountains, cycling, and Jovanotti; shake it all up and find a Fossati—assuming there's still one around—to best serve the sensations that the former rapper was able to offer the entire world during the week of July 26, 2025. The mountains have always guaranteed strong emotions: in sport as in life. Jovanotti, miraculously recovered from a myriad of physical ailments, was able to push himself even further. First, he sailed on the road from Cortona to Friuli-Venezia Giulia in the company of, among others, Paolo Bettini and Daniele Bennati, dragging two former renowned athletes on a 770-kilometer pedaling adventure: "Grillo," an Olympic and world champion, as well as a classics hunter who later abruptly retired from competitive cycling; and "Benna," what remains of the sprinter who later became the coach of a national team that never came into being. And then he performed on the mountain stage in the only concert of his 2025.

Bettini hasn't been too forthcoming on social media about his approach to the Lakes. "Benna" Bennati gave an interview to a local Arezzo newspaper, somewhat vulgarly describing the outing as "awesome." Well...

The fact is that in a snippet of video shot in Bagni di Romagna, where the Giro d'Italia was once hosted with particular enthusiasm, the two acolytes are glimpsed behind Jovanotti, with facial expressions ranging from interested to beaming. Grillo, however, is less so than Benna.

Jovanotti's idea isn't entirely new and stems from the sincere love that renowned artists have for cycling, even as the two-wheeled discipline is now approaching the final stages of acceptable exasperation. Nicola di Bari tricked Vincenzo Torriani into "inventing" something to complement the Milan-Sanremo race of the 2003s and/or as part of the Canta-Giro. Ligabue showed up at the finish line of the Giro d'Italia in the early XNUMXs and in XNUMX christened his own tour in theaters as the Giro d'Italia. And that front-row violinist Riccardo Muti, who joined Evelina Christillin and Alberto Lavazza's heir, jokingly nicknamed "Caffettiera"?

Artists from other fields we met who dreamed of special intimacy in their performances were painters and sculptors of the caliber of Aligi Sassu (always present when the Milan-Turin race was born at the Teatro Carcano thanks to relatives of the Giordano family) and Mario Schifano, who claimed to paint the last kilometer of every Grand Prix of the Mountain of the Giro d'Italia towards the end of the 1990s.

But these are stories for another time, right? Let's not digress too much...

Jovanotti, it was said. 

Departure from Cortona that 

“my country that is on the hill  

lying like a sleeping old man

boredom, abandonment, nothingness

I am your illness

I'm leaving you in my country and going away" 

thus portrayed by the adopted Mantuan Franco Migliacci, by Jimmy Fontana, by Carlo Pes and by Italo Grego in “Che sarà” and interpreted at the Sanremo Festival by the blind Josè Feliciano who reminded him so much of his Lares in Puerto Rico which he abandoned to move to New York.

Destination: Fusine Lakes for Jovanotti, his companions, the orchestra, and five thousand cyclists who bought tickets at €57 each, which sold out on Ticketone in 34 minutes: gross takings of approximately €285.00. We would have gladly gone too—and by "we" I mean the faithful Lagotto Hugo and myself—even if only to say hello to Bettini and Bennati for the series. Visas and Re-Visas , braving that steep climb and heedless of the threat of rain, if we had not been prevented from purchasing the ticket also for the truffle dog that had by now become inseparable.

And so we have to trust the emotions communicated by third parties.

For example, in the Corriere di Arezzo, before the concert on July 26, Francesca Muzzi wrote:

If it were the title of a Jovanotti song, it would be "Lucky Boy," because in addition to giving him a dream, one day Daniele Bennati, former professional cyclist and former national team coach, was also given a bike. And pedaling, pedaling, together with Lorenzo Cherubini and a great team of other cyclists, they reached Tarvisio. Tonight, Jovanotti will take the stage at the No Borders Music Festival for his only concert of the summer of 2025: the Jova Bike Party. "These were unique and emotional days. Beautiful. An experience full of beautiful and authentic moments," says Daniele Bennati.

On BikeItalia you can read the story shared at the end of the cycle path:

“Looking around at this people on bicycles I feel that there is an affinity that transcends everyone, something that links the love for the bike to Jova's music, a widespread feeling that knows no frustration for bad weather and does not complain. A positive feeling, a predisposition to good humor that every cyclist knows when pedaling and that you encounter when you listen to Lorenzo's songs.

"There is no good or bad weather, but good and bad equipment." is another one of those mantras that they repeat to you after years of hiking and cycling. Around, a group of people equipped as best they can and as best they can. Some have enviable Gore-Tex covers and some have covered their shoes with plastic bags, each of us has our own way of facing bad weather, like the adversities that can happen during life and the river of bicycles of all types, from the Graziella, to the 'Eroica' bike, electric bikes, racing bikes, gravel bikes, normal city bikes; trailers and child seats.

And Luca Dandoni on lastampa.it gave voice to the leading actor, Jovanotti:

The journey is made of memories and stories. "Look at the Tiber here, how small it is," he says, getting off his bike, pointing to what is little more than a stream through the trees. "As a child, I lived very close to the Tiber; in Rome, the Tiber is large and majestic. So my dad took me with him to this place, where the Tiber is very small, and he said to me, 'Look: this is the river that passes near our house; it's large and important, but when it starts, it's this small.' And in life, I've identified with myself, when I felt like something growing and accumulating debris, and I thought back to this lesson my old man taught me when I was a child, dedicating an entire day to it."

The journey also took in Castrocaro, home of the legendary music festival. It was in the town's festival hall that Lorenzo held his first rehearsals for the Palajova, where he began to seriously hold a microphone again. "I'm entering one of the most beautiful places of my life," he says in a video reel, revealing that Castrocaro was also where he completed the entire physiotherapy program that allowed him to get back into shape. "It's my favorite place. 'Castro Caro,' I call it, splitting the word in two. Here in the hall, I prepared the Palajova with the band, and I'm sure not even Oasis, who just reunited, have ever had such a beautiful place to rehearse. I'm ecstatic when I see it." So much so that before entering, the artist takes off his shoes and walks barefoot, as one does when crossing the threshold of a sacred place.

But perhaps the most moving part is the people he meets: when he stops and while he pedals, whether they're drivers, motorcyclists, or cyclists. They approach him, say hello, encourage him, and hand him their phones to say hello to his mom.

And the physical pain? "It still hurts today," she wrote before leaving. "I have this constant pain that's become so familiar that I treat it like a traveling companion. I'm on top of it, I train every day, it challenges me, I don't give up. Together, we'll go far." After the first day of cycling and 2500 meters of elevation gain, out of breath and smiling, she said: "It hurts a little. But I thought it would be worse."

Thank you. Putting the various pieces together, you get the impression of a reel that slowly becomes the true embodiment of an idea become reality. For once, allow the pun. Within the various tales are true stories that only an emotional extremist like Lorenzo Cherubini could make current and accessible to all those who, as they climb, climb, climb, sense something spiritual. Always. And with any companion. Even better if He's Jovanotti. Because He, Jovanotti, continues to be convinced that things can be changed, just as he said in his first album, "...for President."

Who knows what Jova's next invention will be...