Senior Member
Join Date: May 2008
Location: Fredericksburg, Va
Posts: 9,579
Bikes: '65 Frejus TDF, '73 Bottecchia Giro d'Italia, '83 Colnago Superissimo, '84 Trek 610, '84 Trek 760, '88 Pinarello Veneto, '88 De Rosa Pro, '89 Pinarello Montello, '94 Burley Duet, 97 Specialized RockHopper, 2010 Langster, Tern Link D8
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sheddle sums it up well for me. There must be a reason so many bikes in the history of the grand Tours have been Italian. Today the mix is greater but the Italians are more often next to the podium than not. The passion comes through it all.
Originally Posted by
sheddle
... Italian stuff always reminded me of the old saying for sports cars that fast should be beautiful- i.e. that aesthetics and function aren't separate, but are in fact two sides of the same coin, and that the world's best bicycle or car should also be the world's most beautiful one. Of course a lot of this is fictitious, but there's still an element of truth to different cultures bringing different philosophies to engineering to the table.
I think this quote, ironically not from an Italian framebuilder (but one very much inspired by them) sums that up-
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