Negasi Haylu Abreha will never forget November 4, 2020. “Of course not. How could I? It’s when it all started.”

The Ethiopian, then 20, was set to fly from Pisa in Italy to his home city of Mek’ele in the region of Tigray via the country’s capital Addis Ababa. He would be reunited with his family after five months living and racing in Italy with NTT Continental Cycling Team, a move that came about following a win in his national road race championships a year earlier.

Negasi Haylu woke early that day. “It was 2am and I checked my phone. The fighting had started.” Following years of increased hostilities, a civil war had begun between the Tigray People’s Liberation Front (TPLF) and the Ethiopian federal government, the latter backed by Eritrea and militants from the bordering region of Amhara. Negasi Haylu immediately knew his chances of arriving home in Tigray were slim.

“I told our manager Kevin [Campbell] that I could not go to my country because a war had started, but he said, ‘No, no, don’t worry, you can go, stay in Addis Ababa, and after a week when the war is finished, you can go to Tigray.’ I tried to explain to him that it wouldn’t be like this, but he was sure it would be fine.” Negasi Haylu listened to Campbell and boarded the first flight to Rome. “When I arrived in Rome, he called me and said, ‘Negasi, I am sorry, everything is cancelled. Please come back.’” Within a few hours, Negasi Haylu had returned to Lucca. It would be a long time before he returned.

This article was published in Rouleur magazine in October 2023. You can read the full article here.