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Paolo Bettini

Personal information
Full name	Paolo Bettini
Nickname	Grillo
Date of birth	April 1, 1974 (age 33)
Country	Italy
Height	1.69 m
Weight	58 kg
Team information
Current team	Quick Step-Innergetic
Discipline	Road
Role	Rider
Rider type	Classics specialist/Sprinter
Professional team(s)
1997 1998 1999-2002 2003-	MG-Technogym Asics Mapei Quick Step-Innergetic
Major wins
Tour de France, 1 stage Giro d'Italia, 2 stages Vuelta a España, 1 stage UCI Road World Cup (2002, 2003, 2004) World Road Race Champion (2006) Olympic Games Road Race (2004) Liège-Bastogne-Liège (2000, 2002) Züri-Metzgete (2001, 2005) Milano-Sanremo (2003) Tirreno-Adriatico (2004) Giro di Lombardia (2005, 2006) Clásica de San Sebastián (2003) HEW Cyclassics (2003)  Italy Road Race Champion (2003, 2006)
Infobox last updated on:
December 14, 2006

Paolo Bettini (born April 1, 1974) is an Italian road cyclist with the Belgian Quick Step-Innergetic professional cycling team. He is the gold medal winner of the 2004 Athens Olympics road race and of the 2006 World Road Race Championship. Bettini is a 3-time champion of the UCI Road World Cup series consecutively in 2002, 2003 and 2004. He has also won stages of the Tour de France, Giro d'Italia, and Vuelta a España. He finished in 9th place at the 2000 Summer Olympics, and won a silver medal at the 2001 World Championships in Lisbon, Portugal.

He is nicknamed "Il Grillo" ("The Cricket") for his propensity to attack repeatedly, and for his sprinting style.

Contents 1 Career 2 Early career 3 2002 World Cup and race season 4 2003 World Cup and race season 5 2004 World Cup and race season 6 2005 UCI ProTour and race season 7 2006 UCI ProTour and race season 8 2007 UCI ProTour and race season 9 Palmarès 10 External link

Bettini was born in Cecina, in the province of Livorno (Tuscany).

He first gained prominence by winning the prestigious classic Liège-Bastogne-Liège race for the now-defunct Mapei team in 2000 and again in 2002. In 2001 he won the Züri-Metzgete for the first time. He set the record for the most number of World Cup race wins in a single season in 2003, by winning the Milan-Sanremo, HEW Cyclassics and Clásica de San Sebastián, and is widely considered to be the best one-day road racer in the world.

Bettini started his career as a domestique to classics star Michele Bartoli. However, Bartoli's injury and Bettini's wins in several key races meant that he was given more latitude to race for himself. Bettini won the 2000 edition of Liège-Bastogne-Liège and a flat stage of the 2000 Tour de France from Agen to Dax near the Pyrenees, barely edging out the charging peloton. The next year he won the 2001 Züri-Metzgete after a few months lacking any wins. Having made his way into the winning breakaway, he beat the favorite Jan Ullrich in the finale of the race by using his acceleration to jump away from Ullrich in the sprint to the finish. His worsening feud with Bartoli culminated in the 2001 World Cycling Championship in Lisbon, Portugal, where even though he was in the final breakaway with Bartoli, the latter refused Bettini's request to lead him out in the sprint finish, thus allowing Spaniard Freire to win the race.

Having been the trusted domestique of Michele Bartoli in previous years, the 2002 season was a breakthrough season for Bettini with the departure of both Bartoli and Museeuw from the Mapei team. Bettini started his World Cup campaign with an aggressive ride in the finale of Milan-Sanremo, but he was caught in the final kilometers of the race. After his 1-2 win with Stefano Garzelli in Liège-Bastogne-Liège where both riders displayed brilliant tactical riding for their team Mapei, Paolo ran neck-to-neck against contender Johan Museeuw, who won the Paris-Roubaix in a 50-km solo breakaway, and the HEW Cyclassics. A tactical ride in Giro di Lombardia earned Bettini the World Cup.

Paolo Bettini played a strong support role in Mario Cipollini's victory in the UCI Road Cycling World Championship in Zolder, Belgium.

The 2003 World Cup series started with Bettini's daredevil ride in winning the opener Milan-Sanremo. Attacking twice in the last hills leading down to the Primavera, Bettini had the excellent help of his super-domestique Luca Paolini, who attacked down the tricky descent towards the finish.

However, injury sustained in the Gent-Wevelgem forced Bettini to miss several races until the Tour de France in July. He then followed through with a charismatic win in the HEW Cyclassics in front of Tour de France runner-up Jan Ullrich, and a win in the Clásica de San Sebastián.

Unfortunately Paolo Bettini failed to win the UCI Road Cycling World Championship despite being the overall favorite, due to a tactical mistake at the end of the race. Having established himself in the winning breakaway with Spaniard Igor Astarloa, a moment's hesitation allowed Astarloa to break away to the finish to win the race. At the end of the race Astarloa claimed that Bettini had offered him money to relinquish the win, which Astarloa said he refused. A feud ensued, and Astarloa has since attributed his comment to a misunderstanding between his Spanish and Bettini's Italian [1].

The 2004 season started well with his performance in the Milan-Sanremo, but saw an emergent Davide Rebellin win the triplet of La Flèche Wallonne (not in the World Cup), Liège-Bastogne-Liège and Amstel Gold Race. Bettini's disappointments only continue with second-place finishes in the HEW Cyclassics which he had won previously, and again in the Clásica de San Sebastián, again which he had won only last year. The points gained in Paris-Tours - usually a pure sprinters race - was enough to put him in the World Cup leader's jersey, but with the last race the Giro di Lombardia better suited to Rebellin's riding style, the World Cup was not yet safe.

However, despite the absence of Luca Paolini due to injury - which meant the loss of a native of the race circuit - Bettini managed to follow Rebellin throughout the race and control his climbing, resulting in Rebellin quitting in frustration.

Paolo's most important victory was in the 2004 Summer Olympics which saw him break away with only one other rider in the final laps and sprinting for a comfortable margin of victory. Unfortunately, he yet again failed to win the UCI Road Cycling World Championship due to a knee injury when he banged his knee against the team car at the beginning of the race.

After participating in the Milan-Sanremo, Bettini had an injury-marked season start which prevented him from having any significant participation in the spring classics, and he didn't get any victories until he got two stage wins at the 2005 Giro d'Italia, where he also donned the maglia rosa for several days. After that, he didn't get any more good results until the 2005 Vuelta a España, where he beat Alessandro Petacchi in an uphill sprint in Valladolid. After that, he took part in the Cycling World Championship in Madrid, where he got into the decisive break but, once again, he could not win and did not even get a medal. However, one week later, Bettini won the Züri-Metzgete for a second time in his career. Capitalizing on his form, two weeks following Zürich he won the last classic of the season the Giro di Lombardia as well.

Bettini won the 15th stage in the 2006 Giro d'Italia. Following the Giro, he became the Italian National Road Race Champion before going on to capture the world champion's jersey at the Road World Championships 2006.

When his brother Sauro died in a car accident a few days after that victory, Bettini was on the verge of abandoning professional cycling. However he changed his mind and soon afterwards won the Giro di Lombardia classic, in tears.

On March 2, 2007, Velo magazine awarded Bettini the prestigious Velo d'Or award as the best cyclist for 2006.^[1]

Bettini traveled across the pond to race the 2.HC-rated 2007 Tour of California and made it worth his while by capturing Stage 4 in a sprint finish.

Olympic medal record
Men’s Cycling
Gold	2004 Athens	Road cycling
World Championships
Gold	2006 Salzburg	Elite Men's Road Race
Silver	2001 Lisbon	Elite Men's Road Race

• UCI Road World Cup (2002, 2003, 2004)
• Gold Medal – UCI World Championships Road Race (2006)
• Gold Medal – Olympics Men's Road Race (2004)
• 1 stage win – 2000 Tour de France
• 1 stage win – 2006 Giro d'Italia
  • Maglia ciclamino points classification (Final)
• 1 stage win – 2005 Giro d'Italia
  • Maglia ciclamino – points classification (Final)
  • Maglia rosa – general classification (after Stages 1, 3, 4 and 6)
• 1 stage win – 2006 Vuelta a España
• 1 stage win – 2005 Vuelta a España
• 1 stage win – 2004 Tour de Suisse
•  Italy National Road Race Championship (2003, 2006)
• Liège-Bastogne-Liège (2000, 2002)
• Milan-Sanremo (2003)
• Giro di Lombardia (2005, 2006)
• Clásica de San Sebastián (2003)
• HEW Cyclassics Cup (2003)
• Züri-Metzgete (2001, 2005)
• Tirreno-Adriatico (2006)
  • Stage 1 and 2 (win and leader's jersey)
• Tirreno-Adriatico (2004)
• Tour Méditerranéen (2003)
  • Yellow jersey – general classification (Final; since Stage 4)
  • Blue jersey – points classification (Final; since Stage 1)
• Tour des Régions Wallonnes (2002)
• Tour du Latium (2002)
• Tour de la province de Lucques (1999)
• Semaine Internationale Coppi-Bartali (2000)
• Tour de la Riviera Ligure (2002)
• GP di Lugano (2006)
• Trofeo Soller (2006)
• GP Camaiore (2004)
• Giglio d'Oro (2004)
• Mendrisio d'Or (2003)
• Coppa Sabatini (2002)
• Coppa Placci (2001)
• Memorial Cecchi Gori (2000)
• Championship of Tuscany (amateur) (1999)
• Coupe Hoffbrau (contre-la-montre par équipes) (1997)
• 1 stage win, Tour of California (2007)

• Paolo Bettini's official website

Preceded by Tom Boonen	World Road Racing Champion 2006	Succeeded by current
Preceded by Erik Dekker	UCI Road World Cup Champion 2002, 2003, 2004	Succeeded by Danilo Di Luca UCI ProTour Champion

Cycling at the Summer Olympics | Olympic champions in men's individual road race

1896: Aristidis Konstantinidis | 1900-1920 | 1924: Armand Blanchonnet | 1928-1932 | 1936: Robert Charpentier | 1948: Jose Beyaert | 1952: Andre A. Noyelle | 1956: Ercole Baldini | 1960: Viktor Kapitonov | 1964: Mario Zanin | 1968: Pierfranco Vianelli | 1972: Hennie Kuiper | 1976: Bernt Johansson | 1980: Sergei Sukhoruchenkov | 1984: Alexi Grewal | 1988: Olaf Ludwig | 1992: Fabio Casartelli | 1996: Pascal Richard | 2000: Jan Ullrich | 2004: Paolo Bettini

Riders on Quick Step-Innergetic
Serge Baguet | Carlos Barredo | Paolo Bettini | Tom Boonen | Wilfried Cretskens | Steven de Jongh | Addy Engels | Mauro Facci | Juan Manuel Gárate | Dmitry Grabovskiy | Kevin Hulsmans | Alessandro Proni | Sébastien Rosseler | Ivan Santaromita | Leonardo Scarselli | Hubert Schwab | Kevin Seeldraeyers | Gert Steegmans | Bram Tankink | Andrea Tonti | Matteo Tosatto | Jurgen Van de Walle | Kevin van Impe | Peter Van Petegem | Cédric Vasseur | Geert Verheyen | Davide Viganò | Giovanni Visconti | Wouter Weylandt |  Maarten Wynants
Manager
Patrick Lefevere