The passing of Ottavio Dazzan: the sad departure of one of the five world champions of Argentine cycling

Sports lovers in Argentina remember with particular affection those athletes who at different moments in history carried the white and blue flag high. AND Ottavio Dazzan, cyclist who He died this week at the age of 66, it is undoubtedly one of them.

Of course, Maradona’s glory in Mexico 86′, the exploits of Vilas and Gaby Sabatini at the US Open or Manu Ginobili’s unforgettable evenings in the NBA, because they are representatives of disciplines with a much greater impact, will always stand out from the others. , but there are also others who have left a profound mark with their passing.

Dazzan, who less than a month ago (Tuesday 19 December) was present at the Olimpia awards ceremony at the Usina del Arte and who at the beginning of last year made a revolution by being present at the Vuelta de San Juan, He had a heart attack and caused a stir with his early farewell.

He was world junior champion in Lausanne, Switzerland, in 1975. He won six medals – four silver and two bronze – in four Senior World Cups between the Zurich 1983 and Ghent, Belgium, 1988 editions and was an Olympian in 1980. Undoubtedly a leading figure in national sport.

He was born on January 2, 1958 in Quilmes, where his parents, Italian immigrants, arrived after the Second World War. Luigi Silvio, Ottavio’s father, was also a cyclist, although not at the level that his son would reach years later, and planted the seed of his extraordinary career.

“Tears that fill the face of Ottavio’s father with salt”, says a period report from El Grafico, after the 1975 world championship, which reflects the size of the goal achieved and which, in turn, explains the brotherly love between father and son. At that time they defined the day of June 25, 1975 as “the most transcendental in the history of Argentine cycling.” Flower of praise.

He is one of the five world champions that Argentine cycling has Marcelo Alessandrowho won the interrupted start time trial in 1981, Cristian Leone (1991, in the specialty of scoring laps) and the duo of Juan Curuchet and Walter Pérez (2004, track cycling), the latter are the only ones to have achieved it at senior level.

Also representing Argentina he obtained two gold medals at the 1974 Pan American Games in Cali, at 16 years old in the time trial and individual speed trials. In those years when Guillermo Vilas threatened everyone on the ATP circuit and Carlos Monzón seemed invincible among the middleweights, the name of Ottavio Dazzan was one of those aiming to conquer part of the place that these two monopolized in the press. Sometimes he succeeded.

The path of this rising star took a turning point in 1976. The coup d’état of March 24, which overthrew President María Estela Martínez de Perón and installed the military regime, did not go unnoticed by the Dazzans. They saw them pass in front of the family workshop, where they made around 300 bicycles a year, war tanks and, with them, terror. A dramatic scene that led them to look back at their beloved Italy with affection.

There Ottavio’s career will continue its course, starting again in the land of his parents. He became an Italian citizen and was thus able to participate in the Moscow Olympic Games 1980, after the Argentine delegation joined the United States boycott against the Soviet Union for its invasion of Afghanistan. He came eighth in the 1000 meter sprint.

She settled in Settimo Torinese, a city located in the Piedmont region, and remained tied to this world that gave her so much joy until the last days of her life. You have worked for many years as a technician, guiding the destinations of several professional cyclists and also in adapted cycling. And she had a business in Italy where she sold her bicycles.

Likewise, he has never forgotten his beginnings. “It’s nice, every now and then, to unplug from there and come to Argentina”he said in one of his last public appearances, when he was at the Vuelta de San Juan 2023 to assist his brother Benito, who was taking part in the competition dedicated to fans.

There too he threw an elevator pitch: “There is little, very little talk about those who made history, and there are many of us. We have given so much to cycling.”