This is a new tragedy that affects Italian cycling, five years after the accidental death of Michele Scarponi, hit by a van a few kilometers from his home during a training outing in 2017. The same tragedy continued Davide Rebellin , who died at 51 on Wednesday in eerily similar circumstances. Davide Rebellin, 51, was hit in the town of Montebello Vicentino, in Veneto (northeast), by a truck that did not stop. He died instantly.
Triple winner of the Fleche Wallonne
Winner of classics seven times in his career (Liège-Bastogne-Liège, three times the Flèche Wallonne, the Amstel Gold Race, the Clasica San Sebastian and the Zurich Championship), including a resounding hat-trick in the Ardennes in 2004, the former runner was one of the best one-day race specialists of his generation.
But he had tested positive for EPO several months after the Beijing Olympics in 2008 and was definitively sentenced to a two-year suspension, effectively losing his Olympic silver medal. He had nevertheless remained on the professional circuit and continued to run big races in the mid-2000s, at the age of 45.