World Bicycle Day: Tech Used At The 2025 Giro d’Italia

The 2025 Giro d’Italia just ended, and ironically, on the same week as World Bicycle Day. The race opened in Durrës on 9 May and closed in Rome on the 1st of June. There will be new tools that turned every route and crash into great tech in television.

EMG/Gravity Media Italy took worldwide pictures from 6 external broadcast trucks, each kitted with AI-assisted cameras, drones and helicopter feeds. Alessandro Curti of Boost Graphics explained that more than 120 specialists juggled all signals to keep coverage smooth.

Testing during the UAE Tour and Strade Bianche helped directors perfect these tools before the Giro caravan even rolled off the Albanian coast. Those dress rehearsals meant the crew could chase daring angles on gravel lanes or alpine hairpins without delay.

Curti spoke on one graphics co-ordinator who spoke directly to the lead director. That tight link let real time charts slide onto screens at the exact moment a rider surged or a group fragmented, turning raw footage into a living narrative.

What Live Numbers Flowed From The Bikes?

Every contender carried a tiny transponder designed by Velon. The chip gathered speed, cadence and power, then fired those readings through mobile networks to a central hub before racing on to Boost Graphics.

Inside the graphics van, operators sifted the stream and chose the figures that best matched the unfolding plot. Viewers saw coloured bars climb beside a rider’s name whenever wattage spiked on steep gravel.

Weather data, cultural notes and a new “Red Bull kilometre” sprint board sat next to those numbers, turning each stage into a layered story. Curti said the pixel tracking tool on helicopter shots even pinned names above moving riders, so gaps of only a few metres has a new meaning.

The crew fought phone signal dead zones in deep valleys, yet sensors kept feeding through, allowing direct comparisons between breakaway partnerships and the chasing pack with barely a pause.

Why Did Tyres Matter On Every Surface?

Continental, the famous tyre company, supplied race organisation vehicles with AllSeasonContact 2 and UltraContact models to grip rain soaked cobbles in Rome and in Tuscan backroads.

Racing bikes rolled on Grand Prix 5000 S TR tubeless rubber. A Vectran breaker guarded against cuts, while the Black Chili tread compound trimmed rolling friction. Mechanics reported fewer wheel swaps across the 3 week marathon.

Continental’s 5000 TT TR option came through as well during Stage 17’s time trial. Riders cycling through cypress-lined bends named the tyre’s low drag to help when the seconds mattered most. The same casing delivered grip, saving cyclers’ on technical descents and keeping them going on endless hill climbs.

What Gear Kept Riders Safe?

Astana cyclists switched from their usual Italian helmets to ones from their Chinese sponsor XDS. Performance engineer Alex Dowsett praised these helmets for being aerodynamic and comfortable, especially during long mountain stages.

Lidl-Trek riders tested different helmet brands in a velodrome before choosing the one that improved their speed most for Stage 2’s time trial. For regular road stages, they used Trek’s Ballista helmets, so helmet choice was different, depending on the stage.