Paris-Tours 1970. 286 kilometers, plus the kilometers from the unofficial to the official start, total kilometers – more or less – 300. After 200, exhausted, Angelo Bassini has had enough. He gives in, lets go, slows down. He looks for the broom wagon and finds it. But it's full, packed, completely booked. So Bassini is forced to stay in the saddle. He reaches the finish line, not too badly, thirty-fifth, just behind Raymond Poulidor, more than 22 minutes behind the winner – surprisingly – the German Jurgen Tschan. From the finish line, he goes to the sports field, where the changing rooms and showers are. Half an hour later, his team members come looking for him. Alarmed. They couldn't find him. "I was so tired – Bassini recalls – that I had fallen asleep under the water".

Anzulin, they called him. From Romagna, Predappio, born in 1946, farmer father, jack-of-all-trades mother, fifth of six children: "Three boys and three sisters, one and one, one and one, one (me) and one". Fifth grade and then vocational school: "Like middle school nowadays". Meanwhile, the bike: "It was in my blood". So much so that: "At 10, on a woman's bike, I would ride, ride, ride, get lost, not come back, they would come looking for me, worried". First racing bike at 15 years old: "Dad was against it, an uncle convinced him. We went to Faenza to Vito Ortelli. We came home with an Ortelli bike that cost 74,000 lire". Immediately the first team: "It was called Taverna Verde, it was a bar club ballroom...". Shortly after, the first race: "In the Forlì area, as a beginner". Much later, the first victory: "In Meldola, we would also do the Rocca delle Caminate, a two-person sprint, and that time I won".

Winning wouldn't happen often: "The sprint was not my strength". His strength was recovery: "Others would slow down, I would slow down less, and I would push on". The most beautiful success as an amateur: "Tour of Abruzzo in 1969, four stages, I won the fourth stage and also won the overall classification". He was racing for Germanvox from Spilimberto: "The branch, the antechamber of Germanvox-Wega". So much so that the following year he turned professional there: "Germanvox-Wega had two captains, the Dane Ole Ritter for stage races, the Belgian Guido Reybrouck for one-day races. Given my climbing ability, I had to stay close to Ritter". There were two options: "Either I would push him, or he would attack".

Few days of freedom: "They were not planned, the gregario had to be a gregario". Except for rare exceptions: "Tour of Three Provinces, in Camucia, in 1971. I had moved to Scic. Two-person breakaway, the other was Arnaldo Caverzasi. I knew he was faster, I knew I had no chance in the sprint, so I went long, but he jumped me". Then placements, many, but victories, zero. However: "Four Giri d'Italia, all finished, the first in 1970, ninth in a Dolomite stage and twenty-sixth overall". There was much to learn: "The most influential gregario was Carlo Chiappano: he directed us. The most winning gregario was Roberto Poggiali: first in a Tour of Switzerland. The times of attacking bars and fountains were over, every team had two support cars, one stayed behind the captain, the other took care of supplies, but in stages in the South, where there was more sweating and less drinking, we would still stop at bars and fountains".

Four years as a professional, one regret only: "Never having done the Tour de France". But the classics, yes: "From Gand-Wevelgem to the Tour of Flanders. Also Paris-Roubaix. The journey was more adventurous than the race. Four of us in a Fiat 124: the mechanic driving, then me, Giancarlo Toschi and Dino Capitelli, all three from Germanvox-Wega, it was 1970. We left on Friday from Predappio, arrived in Paris at night, Saturday was the registration, Sunday the race, then back in the car, we left Roubaix Sunday evening and arrived home Monday at three in the afternoon, I went to bed and stayed there for three days".

What to eat: "In the pockets, we would put jam sandwiches, ham sandwiches and little quince pastes". What to drink: "Water bottles, at most sugared tea". Wages: "They weren't bad, I was earning four times an worker's salary, but for 10 months a year, and at the end of the year prizes were equally divided among everyone, including mechanics and masseurs". Bonking: "I would bonk when, while helping, I would forget to eat". The cold: "Tirreno-Adriatico 1973, stage from Fiuggi to Pescasseroli, it was already snowing in the morning, but the clothing was what it was, short pants, short-sleeved wool jersey, the little jacket was nylon. To warm up, there were only ointments. On the Forca d'Acero climb, an ice storm. Frozen riders, race stopped, military intervened. I remember Ercole Gualazzini who had taken off his shoes and, crying, was running barefoot in the snow".

Bassini was at the party for Renato Laghi's 80th birthday: "I'm 78 years old. And I owe a lot to cycling. It taught me respect and gratitude, to be correct and responsible, to make sacrifices and hold on". Anzulin was tough in life: "Finished racing, I started living. I emigrated to work in Milan, bank clerk, and meanwhile I started studying again, and in evening classes I graduated as an accountant". A grade not of a gregario, but of a captain: "Fifty-four sixtieths".