One of a kind Lemond
 

This is likely to be one of the only, if not THE only Poprad of this flavor. Story goes an employee walked the 853 tubing down to the production floor and had a Maillot Jaune 853 Poprad made for him. Anyone else ever seen one?

https://cimg2.ibsrv.net/gimg/bikefor...2cfc17b47f.jpg

yep..there's a Poprad frame/fork being sold locally that's painted and labeled as a red/black Maillot Jaune

That's an interesting story considering that Poprads of that era were made of 853 to begin with. The downtube isn't obviously bi-oval (as on the actual Maillot Jaune model) from the picture, and if it's a round tube, I think that's enough to judge the veracity of the story.

One you said “one of a kind Lemond” I thought you meant one that wasn’t complaining about Lance.

Interesting, maybe they aren't that rare after all.

Duh, forgot they were 853. This is third party storytelling at its finest lol. It's a 2003, which used TrueTemper at the time.

You mean exposing Lance for the fraud and awful human that he is?

:thumb::thumb::thumb:

ugh, let's not go there this time.

I checked for the ad and I'm no longer seeing it. He was selling the frameset as a cyclocross-gravel frame. I emailed the guy a couple weeks back and he said he worked at Trek and had the paint shop guy paint the Poprad as an MJ. The paint job looked exactly like a red-black 2001 MJ ( I have one)...complete with Maillot Jaune label on the top tube. I can see some guy working there wanting a custom-unique paint job on a Poprad, but I can't imagine why anyone would paint it as an MJ..with MJ labeling. The frameset certainly looked like a Poprad..(I have one of those too).

Very strange.

Not sure if the guy sold the frameset or just took the ad down. It was listed for 2-3 weeks.

This one was bought in Madison so it's very likely the same bike you saw.

So I think we're back to it being one of a kind :)

^ Cool!

Probably..likely anyway. I just saw the frameset ad a few days ago..certainly less than a week ago. I think he wanted $460 for it initially and then dropped it to $280-ish. If it is the same one..then someone built it up in the last week as he was selling just the frame/fork I think..maybe with the headset..not sure.

Yep, this is my FB friend that bought the frame and built it up a couple days ago. Damn, $280 was a steal. My size too, and I'd been looking for a Poprad :(

Every contender in the Tour used some kind of performance enhancing drug. You can’t achieve that level of success naturally. I don’t want to turn this into a doping thread so, I’m done with my comments.

Let’s see some more Lemond photos.

Mine is 1/1 apparently as well. "Custom" on the top tube with no model name.

Although it's a Trek-era LeMond True Temper Spine frame, not a "real" LeMond.

https://cimg3.ibsrv.net/gimg/bikefor...7f27ae7be1.jpg
https://cimg5.ibsrv.net/gimg/bikefor...e4382b2be9.jpg

Dude that is sick. Why not have it geared up?

fify

Bought it for $200 as a fixie, in Portland of course. Narrow bars, ISIS cranks, and the Brev wheels.

I've been throwing parts at it as I go. It will most likely be geared at some point, kind of a work in progress.

Ah, good ole Portland lol. It's a sweet bike.

I own same frame but all R oad stuff dura ace gonna get repainted to make pretty again

Let's see it!

Man, it would have sucked to work at Trek on the production floor with all these employees walking down and demanding one-off frames to be made for them. :roflmao2:

The 2004 + catalog has a small note for "Customize It!" in the font as is used on my frame above. For some reason, the info page on every scan about the "Custom" program seems to be missing. When I reached out to Trek regarding my frame, the serial number was not cataloged at any point.

This was his response, specifically referring to the Spine frames:

"Alright, so after some digging, I have a little more info for you here. In 2005 (I only have a spec manual and not a catalog for ‘04,) our LeMond catalog has a customization program advertised. Essentially, you chose your frame between either the titanium or steel option, then you build from there, much like our Project One program we have now. All of the photos of the frames available in the catalog don’t have a name designation on the top tube like the rest of the bikes in the lineup due to the fact that the bike models were differentiated via componentry. Eg: The Maillot Jaune came stock with Shimano Dura-Ace 10 speed, where the same frame was used for the Versailles, but came stock with an Ultegra/105 9 speed mix. Unfortunately, I can’t seem to find a digital catalog with the custom page in it, but linked below is the catalog that is missing the full page (pages 14-15) outlining the custom program. All of the bikes from pages 6-13 have the customization option. Full bike specs are toward the back of the catalog."


https://cimg4.ibsrv.net/gimg/bikefor...6a8277a02b.jpg

Exactly. "See page 14", page 14 and 15 are gone.