Damiano Cunego
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40 free Damiano Cunego trivia questions with answers — sports quiz, new questions added Oct 2026.
Damiano Cunego was 22 when he won the 2004 Giro d'Italia, riding as a helper who was never meant to lead. He went on to become one of the best one-day racers of his generation, with three victories in the Giro di Lombardia and a silver medal at the World Championships. This quiz follows the whole story: the junior world title, the tense three weeks that made his name, the classics he won with a climber's legs and a sprinter's finish, his rides at the Tour de France, and the illnesses, crashes and near misses that came after. It is written for cycling fans who remember the peloton of the 2000s and for anyone curious about what happens when a prodigy wins early. Every answer comes with a short explanation.
30 of 40 questions with answers and explanations. Play the quiz
Q 01Damiano Cunego's 2004 Giro d'Italia and Giro di Lombardia wins made a same-year double last done in 1972 by whom?
Eddy Merckx
Eddy Merckx had been the last rider to win Italy's Grand Tour and its autumn monument in one season. Cunego was only 23 when he matched him.
Q 02Which team captain and defending champion did Damiano Cunego upstage to win the 2004 Giro d'Italia?
Gilberto Simoni
Gilberto Simoni finished third behind his own helper. He was furious when the 22-year-old sprinted past him to win stage 18.
Q 03Which nickname did Italian fans give Damiano Cunego, winner of the 2004 Giro d'Italia?
The Little Prince
The Little Prince, Il Piccolo Principe in Italian, nods to Antoine de Saint-Exupéry's boy hero. It stuck because Cunego was seen as one of cycling's great prodigies.
Q 04Damiano Cunego won the Giro di Lombardia three times; by which poetic nickname is that Italian monument known?
The Race of the Falling Leaves
Race of the Falling Leaves is the name it earns as one of the last classics of the year. Cunego's three wins came in 2004, 2007 and 2008.
Q 05Before taking up cycling as a teenager, Damiano Cunego was a successful schoolboy in which other sport?
Cross-country running
Cross-country running won Cunego a regional schools title before he switched to the bike at 15. He then won 14 races in his first season of cycling.
Q 06What colour is the leader's jersey that Damiano Cunego wore into the finish of the 2004 Giro d'Italia?
Pink
Pink marks the overall leader of Italy's Grand Tour. Cunego added four stage wins on his way to keeping the jersey.
Q 07Giuseppe Martinelli, who discovered Damiano Cunego, also worked with which Italian 1998 Giro and Tour winner?
Marco Pantani
Marco Pantani was Martinelli's star rider. In 1999 the same director offered Cunego a professional contract straight from the junior ranks, and the teenager turned it down.
Q 08In which city of Veneto, close to his home village, did Damiano Cunego win the 1999 junior world road race title?
Verona
Verona hosted the 1999 road races, and Cunego crossed the line alone after dropping his last rival on the Torricelle climb.
Q 09Which spring classic did Damiano Cunego win in 2008 by outsprinting Fränk Schleck at the top of the Cauberg hill?
Amstel Gold Race
Amstel Gold Race glory came in the final 200 metres. The win lifted Cunego to the top of the 2008 ProTour standings.
Q 10Damiano Cunego hoped to end his career at the 2018 Giro d'Italia; why did that farewell never happen?
His team was not invited
His team was not invited, because organisers handed the four wildcard places to other squads. Cunego bowed out at the Italian national championships that June instead.
Q 11Which classification did Damiano Cunego win on his Tour de France debut in 2006?
Young rider
Young rider honours brought Cunego the white jersey in Paris. He had spent June training hard to fix his weak time-trialling before the race.
Q 12On which famous Tour de France summit did Damiano Cunego finish second in 2006, behind only Fränk Schleck?
Alpe d'Huez
Alpe d'Huez closed stage 15, and the Luxembourger only shook Cunego off in the final two kilometres of the climb.
Q 13Damiano Cunego first rode the Tour de France in 2006; which apparent winner was later stripped for doping?
Floyd Landis
Floyd Landis failed a drug test after a long solo stage win, and the title passed to the Spaniard Óscar Pereiro.
Q 21In which race did Damiano Cunego win two mountain stages in 2009, including a solo victory at La Pandera?
Vuelta a España
Vuelta a España success ended a five-year wait for a Grand Tour stage win. Cunego then left the race early to prepare for the World Championships.
Q 22In which mountain range did defending champion Damiano Cunego lose six minutes on one 2005 Giro stage?
Dolomites
Dolomites climbing undid Cunego on the first mountain stage, to Zoldo Alto. He blamed the pressure on him and said he felt liberated once his chances had gone.
Q 23Which team-mate attacked alone to beat Damiano Cunego to the 2008 world road race title in Varese?
Alessandro Ballan
Q 14In which Asian country did Damiano Cunego win a one-day Cup race in both 2005 and 2008 to close his season?
Japan
Japan stages its Cup race on a circuit at Utsunomiya. Cunego's last team, Nippo–Vini Fantini, had its roots in the same country.
Q 15In which country did Damiano Cunego win the Tour of Qinghai Lake, his first stage-race title as a professional?
China
China has held the high-altitude race since 2002. Cunego went back in 2017 and took his final professional win there, on a summit finish at 4,100 metres.
Q 16In which city did Damiano Cunego seal the 2004 Giro d'Italia after a final stage from Clusone?
Milan
Milan welcomed 140 finishers from the 171 riders who had set off three weeks earlier. Cunego, still 22, rode in as the overall winner.
Q 17Damiano Cunego's best Tour de France finish was sixth in 2011, behind which first Australian winner of the race?
Cadel Evans
Cadel Evans won at 34. Cunego had set out chasing stage wins and still ended up the best-placed Italian for the second year in a row.
Q 18Damiano Cunego twice won the Settimana Internazionale, a race named after Fausto Coppi and which great rival?
Gino Bartali
Gino Bartali shares the title of a five-day race in Emilia-Romagna. Cunego won it in 2006 and again in 2009, when he also took two stages.
Q 19Which bone did Damiano Cunego break in a crash on stage 18 of the 2015 Giro d'Italia, forcing him out?
Collarbone
Collarbone surgery followed after Cunego fell while riding in the day's breakaway. He was back racing by the end of August.
Q 20Which illness was diagnosed in Damiano Cunego soon after he faded badly at the 2005 Giro d'Italia?
Mononucleosis
Mononucleosis, caused by the Epstein–Barr virus, forced a month of rest. It also kept Cunego out of that summer's Tour de France.
Alessandro Ballan jumped clear in the final kilometres. Cunego won the sprint for silver, then banged his handlebars in frustration instead of celebrating.
Q 24Which Italian, hyped as Damiano Cunego's great rival, won the 2006 Giro d'Italia by over nine minutes?
Ivan Basso
Ivan Basso dropped Cunego on the first summit finish and put more than six minutes into him in the long time trial. Cunego ended the race fourth.
Q 25With which Italian team, named after a coffee-machine maker, did Damiano Cunego turn professional in 2002?
Saeco
Saeco was famous in the 1990s for Mario Cipollini's sprint train. Its sponsor pulled out after 2004, so Cunego's breakthrough year was also the team's last.
Q 26Which Italian team did Damiano Cunego join in a 2005 merger and ride for until the end of 2014?
Lampre
Lampre absorbed his first professional squad, and Cunego stayed for ten seasons. He won two of his three autumn monuments in its colours.
Q 27When injury ruled Damiano Cunego out of the 2008 Olympic road race, which 23-year-old reserve replaced him?
Vincenzo Nibali
Vincenzo Nibali stepped in because Cunego had not recovered from a crash at the Tour de France. Six years later the stand-in won that race himself.
Q 28While Damiano Cunego won the 2004 Giro d'Italia overall, which Italian sprinter took nine stages of the same race?
Alessandro Petacchi
Alessandro Petacchi swept nine sprint finishes and the points jersey. Cunego, a climber with a fast finish, was runner-up in that points competition.
Q 29Serhiy Honchar, runner-up to Damiano Cunego at the 2004 Giro d'Italia, was a time-triallist from which country?
Ukraine
Ukraine had two contenders that year. Honchar won the long time trial, and his compatriot Yaroslav Popovych took the race lead there before Cunego won it back.
Q 30Which rider won the 2006 Liège–Bastogne–Liège in a sprint that left Damiano Cunego third on the podium?
Alejandro Valverde
Alejandro Valverde, an all-rounder riding for Illes Balears, took the sprint four days after also winning Flèche Wallonne.