Ivan Basso

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Template:Road bicycle racer infobox Ivan Basso (born November 26, 1977) is a professional Italian road bicycle racer currently riding for Team CSC. Ivan Basso is among the best mountain riders in the professional field of the 2000s, and is considered one of the strongest stage race riders. He was born in Gallarate, in the province of Varese in Lombardy.

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Biography

As an amateur, he finished second in the 1995 junior World Championships and his first big result was winning the U-23 World Championships in 1998, before he turned professional with Risso-Scotti Vinavil in 1999. Here he won his first professional victories in the 2000 Regio Tour and in 2001 he moved to Fassa Bortolo under the guidance of sporting director Giancarlo Ferretti. He scored several notable victories in 2001, but the next two years were devoid of significant wins even though he had promising rides in the Tour de France.

In the 2002 edition of the Tour de France, Basso finished 11th overall and won the white jersey, the award presented to the rider best-placed in the general classification under 25 years old. He impressed again in the 2003 Tour, finishing seventh overall in spite of receiving little help from his Fassa Bortolo team-mates, who after dedicating their efforts in the first part of the race to help Alessandro Petacchi win four stages all bar 2 members had to pull out due to food poisoning. After Basso's promising start to his Fassa Bortolo career his relationship with Giancarlo Ferretti turned sour when Ivan Basso failed to respond well to the management methods of the "iron sergeant".

Ivan Basso moved to the Danish Team CSC in 2004, to take the role as team captain which Tyler Hamilton left vacant at the Team CSC outfit. Ivan Basso's weakness was the individual time trial and before the 2004 season he and teammate Carlos Sastre trained in a wind tunnel to improve their aerodynamic positioning on the bike. The time trial skills of Ivan Basso was one of the main points of improvements over the next years.

Image:Basso Armstrong Tourmalet 2004.jpg

Basso looked impressive in the 2004 Tour de France, winning stage 12 ahead of eventual winner Lance Armstrong, but due to his relatively poor time trial results, he only finished 8th on the stage 16 time trial up the mountain Alpe d'Huez where he was caught and passed by Armstrong and 6th in the stage 19 time trial, for a combined loss of 5 minutes and 13 seconds. His time loss on the last time trial effectively sent Basso down to third place, behind Andreas Klöden, and Basso finished 6:40 behind winner Lance Armstrong, who was a personal support of the Italian when Ivan Basso learned, during the 2004 Tour, that his mother had cancer, a disease Armstrong had survived. Basso held his daughter in his arms as he was honored in Paris and was resilient about his chances of a future Tour win, and he ended the season, participating with the Italian team in the 2004 World Championships in Verona, helping fellow Italian Luca Paolini get a Bronze Medal.

January 2005 saw the death of Ivan Basso's mother, who died from the cancer. Ivan Basso went on to focus on the 2005 Giro d'Italia, in her memory as his main aim for that season. Basso wore the leader's jersey, the maglia rosa, in the Giro until severe stomach problems caused him to lose the lead on stage 13 before losing another 40 minutes during the 14th stage (a mountain stage which included the Stelvio mountain pass), and thus effectively ended his bid for overall honours. No longer dangerous to the other main riders, Basso decided to continue in the race with the objective of winning stages which he did manage during stage 17 a mountain stage, and also won the 18th stage, a time trial, ahead of team mate David Zabriskie, demonstrating the improvement he had made in this area.

At the 2005 Tour de France, apart from stage 10 (the first mountain stage) where he trailed Lance Armstrong by a minute, Ivan Basso was once again the only rider to keep up with the race leader in the mountains, and on occasion he tried to pressure Armstrong by going on the attack. Basso was still weaker in the time trials although he had improved significantly when compared to last year by losing a collective 3:47 to Armstrong over two stages, he placed second overall in the Tour, 4:40 behind Lance Armstrong. During the 2005 Tour de France, Basso signed a new 3-year contract with CSC running up to 2008, ending speculation that he might defect to Discovery Channel to take over after the retiring Lance Armstrong.

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