Nairo Quintana's story is woven with a mix of myth and incredible truth. The man who hoped to become South America's first Tour winner is a fascinating personality and a real talent.

A CYCLIST’S HOME DEFINES him, both physically and spiritually, and Quintana’s journey to last summer’s battle on the Alpe is unlike any in the peloton. Much of his background is cloaked in mystery and misconception, and separating myth from reality requires some scrutiny.

This much we know: Quintana was raised in a two-story adobe home his father built in a village called Vereda La Concepción, perched above Cómbita, the region’s main city, along the sub-tropical edge of the Colombian Andes. At nearly 10,000 feet, it’s so far off the grid you can’t even find it on Google Maps. Some journalists have painted a picture of Third World misery, but Quintana says that’s far from the truth.

“I don’t come from some lost little village in the mountains. We don’t live in the jungle,” he said after winning the 2014 Giro. “We were never rich, but we never were for want of something. That’s the ignorance of people who do not know what exists on the other side of the world.”

Quintana’s parents raised their five children with dignity on a small land holding. His father sold vegetables in local markets, and his mother ran a strict, Catholic household, making sure her five children all graduated high school. In the stratified Colombian society, the rich live in the valleys, and the poor on the upper slopes.

In today’s peloton where pros seek out altitude camps at Tenerife and Mount Etna, Quintana’s birthplace is his first marginal gain.