COUNTERPOINT THE EGAN OF THE CANAVESE
ide your bike north out of Turin, and follow the signs for the Lanzo and Aosta valleys. In an hour or so you’ll find yourself in the Canavese, an aggregation of market towns and villages whose locals speak an indecipherable dialect and whose capital is a UNESCO World Heritage town. Ivrea is famous for having been home to Olivetti, but there’s much more to the Canavese than that. As a people, the Canavesani are famously obdurate, and famously taciturn. That’s probably because their climate and geology are famously implacable, and it’s no coincidence that the area was once one of Italian cycling’s most fertile breeding grounds. Between them,
