With a high-school diploma in his pocket, he dreamed of having a house by the sea, but instead he left his Sardinia to follow his passion for cycling and found himself climbing up mountains. He started out in football and in tennis but it is on a bicycle that he became the “Cavaliere dei Quattro Mori” (the Sardinian Knight): he achieved two final podiums at the Giro d’Italia (he was the first Sardinian cyclist to have donned the pink jersey) and, in 2015, his victory at the Vuelta crowned the first important stage race of his career. “Losing the Giro d’Italia was more useful to me than winning La Vuelta”, he commented. Punctilious, he does not like the limelight and, at 26, he races for his parents, who have made so many sacrifices for him. Valentina, his girlfriend, follows him at every race; Valentino Rossi, instead, is his idol. And even if he won’t be riding a motorbike in Rio, he’ll be riding fast anyway as he wants to return to Italy (Sardinia) with a medal