No, I wasn’t part of the peloton. I didn’t hand out bottles, drive a team car or even wave from a sponsor caravan. I’m just a guy who’s a little too enthusiastic about bikes and decided to experience the Giro as it should be experienced—not via a choppy livestream, not on TV, and definitely not on some sketchy site that steals your data along with the broadcast rights.
I watched it live. On the streets of Rome. From the heat and chaos to the roar of the tifosi echoing through ancient ruins, I was there. And if I had to sum it up in one word? EPIC!
But I’ll go further than that. Because if you ever dreamed of seeing the Giro in person, this might be the nudge you need.
When in Rome
Rome has always been the gold standard of tourist cities. A place so packed with history, architecture, and pizza that you could live there for years and still stumble across something new every week. Unfortunately, I didn’t have years. I had roughly two and a half days. So, just like Julius Caesar came, saw, and conquered, so did I: come, see, and, well, eat gelato. Conquering is for people on diets. There’s no way around it—Rome has a lot to see. That’s an understatement. Rome has everything to see. But this time, I wasn’t there to play tourist. I was there for the Giro. And that meant soaking in every last drop of the atmosphere, even if it meant skipping a few ruins.
First thing you notice when Rome hosts the Giro? Half the public transport gives up. Buses are rerouted, trams vanish into the void, and the metro becomes an unpredictable lottery. So, if you’re planning to spectate, brace yourself: you’ll be walking. A lot. I clocked over 20 km each day—and I wasn’t even trying. But I had a mission. The final stage featured eight laps through the city, and I wanted to see the peloton from a different spot each time. That meant scouting, planning, dodging crowds, and sometimes sprinting like Mads, but with a bit more dedication.
Of course, not everything went according to plan. But I still managed to catch the peloton 10 times. Yes, eight laps, 10 sights. It’s all about the planning. The scouting the day before, and most importantly, having plans A, B, C and D. Was it worth it? Absolutely!
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The day of the Giro
Rome was pink. Not entirely pink—but pink enough to make you wonder if the Vatican had rebranded. That said, the vast majority of tourists had absolutely no idea a cycling race was happening. They were busy chasing popes and gladiator selfies. The overcrowded metro and mysteriously missing buses were subtle clues that something big was afoot. But if you wandered near the course, the sea of pink banners, flags, and outfits gave it away. Something was definitely going on.
Earlier in the day, before the pros rolled out, there was a family ride along the closed streets. A lovely touch—kids on bikes, parents in matching kits, and enough pink to make Peppa Pig proud. It wasn’t quite the thunder of the peloton, but it was wholesome chaos and a great warm-up for what was to come. The atmosphere was slowly building toward something special. You could feel it buzzing through the crowd, humming in the cobblestones, sweating through your clothes (31°C and counting). The only real letdown? The fan zone. Or, more accurately, the lack of one.
Compared to the Tour de France, where sponsor villages feel like mini cycling festivals, the Giro’s merch setup was… underwhelming. A few branded vans here and there, selling bundles with a bidon and bandana or maybe a hat and a cotton T-shirt masquerading as a jersey. No actual cycling gear, no interactive fan experience, not even a place to sit and melt slowly into your espresso. And this was the Grand Tour Final. If I had to give the merchandise a grade? D-minus. Generous curve.
Still, the spirit was there. It bloomed along the barricades, simmered in the heat, and even infected the unsuspecting tourists who just wanted to see a fountain and ended up cheering for “Whoever is in the first place,” not understanding what a leadout is all about.
The fever was building. And once the riders rolled in, it would boil over.
The start
Getting to my first planned viewing spot? Yeah—didn’t happen. An empty stomach, poor shoe choices (rookie mistake), and a few rapidly evolving blisters were conspiring to derail my strategy before the race even began. But salvation arrived in the form of a still-operating city bus, which dropped me off right near the Tiber, just in time for the action to properly kick off. And let me tell you, seeing the peloton in person for the first time is… disorienting. On TV, they look like warriors. In real life? More like a high school field trip—until they start pedalling. Then it clicks.
These aren’t kids out for a ride. These are elite athletes pushing speeds that would get your license suspended in most urban zones. And they’re doing it on two wheels, over the ancient cobblestones of Rome, dodging tram tracks, potholes, and tourist confusion like it’s a video game and they can just respawn at the push of a button. They can’t, as Roglic will definitely agree.
Speaking of infrastructure, near the Colosseum, the roads look more appropriate for archaeology than high-speed racing. A few cracks and tram lines turn every turn into a gamble. Crashes? Punctures? Accidental launches into orbit? All very much on the table.
But for now, the riders glide past. Smooth. Fast. Effortless. Your brain still wants to call them “kids”, but your gut now understands: the race is on. They’re headed off to Ostia Antica now. In two hours, they’ll be back. And that’s when the real spectacle begins.
The calm before the storm
The closer the riders got to Rome, the harder it became to find a decent viewing spot. Getting near the Colosseum? Forget it. Once the peloton hit the city streets, that area turned into a human sardine can. So, Plan A was out the window. Thankfully, Plan B was ready to go.
I made my way to Piazza Venezia, one of the best spots to catch the action and, as it turns out, a magnet for fans who actually knew what they were doing. The atmosphere was already buzzing. Riders were about to hit one of the trickier corners on the course, where the roadwork from the ongoing Metro excavations had turned the slick cobbles into a dust-covered skating rink. Fans were tossing banter back and forth— “UAE is buying success,” “Pogi would have destroyed Simon on Finestre,” and so on. But ever so often, a police siren would ripple through the noise, and everyone would tense up, hoping it was the race arriving. It wasn’t. Not yet. But then… the caravan.
A sudden blast of music, and the streets lit up with colour, chaos, and pure Tour energy. The sponsor parade rolled through, complete with branded vehicles and staff, hyping the audience and that glorious oversized Giro trophy glinting in the Roman sun. Cheering broke out. Kids screamed. Adults screamed. A man near me nearly wept at the sight of the Neverending trophy. And then we waited. Because the caravan is just the spark.
The explosion, fifteen minutes away, was about to hit.
The storm
If you’re thinking of watching the Giro finale in Rome next year, here’s a pro tip: stop getting your hopes up every time a car goes by. There are about a hundred of them—race officials, sponsors, mechanics, police—long before the riders show up. The key is the sky. Look for the chopper. The Giro’s helicopter is your northern star. It hovers above the peloton like a guardian angel. Once it starts circling over Rome, you know the storm is coming.
I was standing in one of the few spots without real barriers. Just a couple of plastic roadblocks that fans had commandeered as makeshift benches. When the chopper flew over the Colosseum, the crowd stiffened. One minute. That’s all we had before the pink blur arrived. A few police bikes rolled through. One officer, riding maybe 30 seconds ahead of the peloton, started hyping the crowd—arms in the air, rallying us like a rock concert emcee. And the crowd? Oh, we roared right back. Then came the corner.
The peloton appeared, slicing through the street like a single organism. Visma at the helm. Simon Yates in full pink: jersey, helmet, bike. The works. They passed in a matter of seconds, but somehow, it all slowed down. You could see their faces—focused, exhausted, eyes locked on the wheel ahead like a hawk tracking prey. No waving. No distractions. Just business. Pure, high-speed business. And then they were gone.
What remained? Noise. A lingering roar and a sea of beaming faces. Newcomers cried. Seasoned fans immediately began comparing this year’s finale to the last ten. It didn’t just spark conversation—it ignited it. The best part? They’d be back in ten minutes.
Me? I was on a mission. I wanted a new vantage point for every lap, inching closer to the finish line each time. My feet were on strike after 30 kilometres of walking, but adrenaline overruled them. On lap three, I saw the riders twice—once from a hill next to the Senatorial Palace, with a sweeping view over the Forum, and again just 600 meters from the finish, thanks to a mad dash over the hill. From there, I kept inching closer. With 200 meters to go, the area was sealed off. So I stood just behind the finish, catching glimpses of the final sprints from the back—cheering, breathless, sunburned, and utterly euphoric.
The finish
The finish was electric. Two commentators—one in Italian, one in English—kept the crowd updated with an energy that bordered on manic. With each lap, the peloton began to look less like a group of riders and more like a high-speed blur. By the final lap, as they barrelled toward the line, they were hitting around 70 kph. It looked unreal, like the entire bunch was phasing through the streets of Rome.
We couldn’t actually see who won the stage—not from where we were—but the commentator, who sounded like he was on the brink of an aneurysm trying to fit every word between gasps, made it very clear: Olav Kooij had taken the win. A perfect finale for Visma. And to top it off, the pink jersey had thrown himself into the leadout. No ego. Just full commitment to the team.
There’s something you never catch on TV: the leadout train after the finish. Cameras always follow the winner, but not the guys who made the win possible. Those riders come in a minute or two later, absolutely spent. They’re the walking definition of cooked… and it’s beautiful. But they have just enough energy left to wave at the crowd. To soak in the cheers. And because they’re not surrounded by photographers or hoisted onto podiums, you can actually see their faces. You can shout their names. You can clap, scream, fist pump, and they’ll respond.
They know. They feel it. Every one of them got the ovation they deserved. Not just from their sprinter, who owes them everything—but from us. The fans. The ones who understand that a victory isn’t just the final sprint. It’s the sum of sacrifice, teamwork, and legs that say “yes” when everything else screams “no”.
The afterglow
There’s one thing I really don’t like about post-race cycling celebrations: they’re gated, literally and figuratively. The fans aren’t just behind barriers. They’re boxed out entirely.
Those of us at the 200 m mark had to sprint—full-on sprint—to even have a chance of catching the podium ceremony before the police sealed it off. The rest were redirected around Circus Maximus, looping toward the back like we were trying to sneak into an exclusive club. The “fan area” near the podium was so narrow that barely a hundred people could squeeze in to witness the historic moment Simon Yates lifted the trophy.
And look, I get it. Riders are spent. They’ve just finished a Grand Tour. They want peace, not selfies. But surely there’s a middle ground—a way to give fans some access. Even if it’s at a distance, even if it’s behind barriers, just being able to see the celebrations properly would mean the world to those who walked 30,000 steps for this moment. Still, it was what it was.
The cheers for Carapaz were deafening, with a pocket of Colombian fans waving flags and chanting until their lungs gave out. But when Simon stepped up in pink, it was all about him. He earned it. And the moment he kissed the trophy… well, I’m not saying his wife should be worried, but that was passionate. The fireworks tried to match the emotion, but they couldn’t. It was pure fairytale stuff. As I zombie-shuffled toward the metro station, legs shot, mind buzzing, I saw a blur of black and pink pass me. A few Visma riders darted through the crowd. Kids chased after them, waving pens and paper. They ducked behind barriers and into the team bus.
And then I saw it—just a glimmer at first. The Neverending Trophy. A guy in a Visma shirt was casually carrying it, not more than a meter from me. Up close, it’s a stunner. Polished. Heavy. Mythical. No wonder Yates let someone else haul it back to the bus. Then… the pink bike. I swear, for a second, I forgot I was a grown adult. I wanted to reach out. I wanted to ask if I could just touch it. It was my size—I’m exactly Simon’s height, after all. But no. Respect matters. Rule number one of being a real fan: the riders come first. You’re not the show. You’re there to witness it, not insert yourself into it.
I didn’t go full “Omi Opi”. I didn’t cross the line. I took a quiet photo, smiled, and limped back to the station—ready for a cold beer and a replay of everything I just lived in real-time. Because even with sore feet, missed selfies, and the tiniest sliver of envy… it was perfect.
So, was it worth watching the Giro Finale live?
Let’s not beat around the bush. Yes. A thousand times, yes. Sure, my feet are still angry with me. My shoes may never forgive me. I didn’t get a selfie with Simon Yates or touch the pink bike (still hurts). And yeah, I saw more police tape than fan zones, and the merch was about as inspired as a lukewarm espresso. But none of that matters.
Because watching the Giro finale live in Rome isn’t just about seeing who wins. It’s about being part of something—sharing space with thousands of people who speak a hundred different languages, but all scream at the same moment when the peloton flies past like a rocket-powered blur. It’s about witnessing the sport we love not through pixels but through goosebumps. Feeling the rumble of the road. Catching the glint of sweat and steel. Watching legends do their thing, live, with a backdrop of ancient ruins and modern chaos.
You can watch replays forever. But you only get one first time being there. So, was it worth it? Absolutely. Even if next time, I’m bringing better shoes. And snacks. And maybe a folding chair.
