Alex Zanardi fa vincere Francesco Canali alla Venicemarathon 2011
Francesco Canali was a runner. First basketball, then the roads, the running.
Then came ALS.
But he kept running. His friends took him to the Palm Beach Marathon, pushing him in a specially made wheelchair.
Well, one evening they were talking about the Venice marathon. They didn’t know how to get Francesco there.
Alex Zanardi came up with: "I’ll take him."
And so he did: he pushed the wheelchair for over 40 km of the marathon and, just a few meters from the finish line, got off his special bike and, wobbling on his stumps, pushed his friend to cross the finish line first.
“Kid, it’s enough just to have heart; it’s about living,
not about coming in first,
and to hell with fate.” (Vecchioni-Guccini/ Ti insegnerò a volare)