Orfeo Pontarolo grew up in Albaredo in the Community of Vedelago, Province of Treviso, in the Northern Italian region of the Veneto.  He was born in 1932.

In his hometown cycling was not only a mode of everyday transport for both men and women but a very popular sport throughout Europe. 

As a young boy growing up in Italy there were two sports that he, like many of his peers, enjoyed: football (soccer) and cycling.  Cycling was a far more popular sport than football and the cyclists of the era were much lauded and treated like rock stars, a bit like the international soccer players of today.  At that time, stage racing over European alps, along unsealed roads created a setting that was not only gruelling but romantic in the eyes of young men.  These cyclists became national heroes. Cycling always remained Orfeo’s favourite sport.  

Orfeo arrived in Australia in 1952. He worked at AI&S and lived in Unanderra Hostel when he first settled in the Illawarra.  One of the first things he bought was his racing bike – a Malvern Star.  Orfeo also joined a local Wollongong Cycle club and raced for the club.  He won and placed in some races and his team members were some famous Wollongong cycling champions namely K. Overton and H. Purvis.

Orfeo raced at the velodrome at MacCabe Park, but he much preferred the road style racing he competed in in Italy.  Road racing was more popular in places like Italy and France. He badly injured himself at a velodrome during a competition race and it was then he decided he would no longer compete in velodrome races.  

Once he married in 1955 and started shift work, had children and a second job, he no longer rode his bike.  Although he and his father would build many home-made bikes for his children.  Orfeo did take up riding again in the 1980s but this was purely for fitness and health.  He would sometimes join his friend Carlo Paiola, a former Italian Olympian, for bike rides from Wollongong to Waterfall.

As sports coverage in Australia improved, Orfeo would be glued to the television for the Tour de France and the Giro d’Italia and as old age took hold, Orfeo would ride a stationary bike accompanying the riders over the hills on the screen.  Orfeo passed away in 2015 but his last bike is still hanging up in his garage and his legacy also lives on in his grandchildren and great grandchildren with their love of cycling.