In Italy on Wednesday former UCI Road World Champion and UCI Gran Fondo Time Trial Champion Mario “Super Man” Cipollini announced he had recently undergone an emergency heart operation to implant a defibrillator due to life threatening ventricular arrhythmias, but he was now doing fine and ready to leave hospital.

The 58 year-old commented on social media, “Thanks to Professor Antonio Dello Russo, the extraordinary conductor of his orchestra in the operating theatre, where they worked with great skill on my operation. Dr Roberto Corsetti, whom I could describe as the pianist in this case, and Dr Laura Cipolletta, who with her gentle hands played the role of first violinist, were all exceptional. Thanks to them, I woke up this morning feeling very fit and ready to return to my activities.”

The previous day Cipollini was not as upbeat about the situation, “Here we go again, or rather, we’re back again. My heart is still acting up a bit. Last year, I had my last operation. Now I have a small recorder near my heart that’s monitoring my cardiac status . The recorder said something went wrong during this period. They called me to order, saying they’d have to try to re-stimulate certain situations with probes to see if anything harmful is triggered.”

As a WorldTour professional Cipollini amassed an impressive 189 victories, including numerous Grand Tour stage wins: 12 Tour de France, 42 Giro d’Italia and 3 Vuelta a Espana. In addition to winning the UCI Road World Championship in 2002, he won the classics Milan-San Remo, E3 Prijs Vlaanderen and Scheldeprijs 2x and Gent-Wevelgem 3x.

After retiring in 2008 he began participating in amateur gran fondos as a celebrity rider. Recently he returned to competition as an age group amateur, winning a UCI Gran Fondo Time Trial World Championship and Gran Fondo World Tour® Championship in 2024.

Photo Credit: M. Cipollini

© 2019-2025 All Rights Reserved Gran Fondo Daily