Do you want to see a sign of a real hard-core racing bike?
I could barely fit a business card between the brake bridge and tire--which is a 700X25C. Yes, that bike isn't meant to take anything more than 700X23.
The bike is an Eddy Mercx road frame from 1994, built as a single-speed with only a front brake. It owner, who came to unlock it as I was about to snap a picture of the whole bike, says, "It rides as great as ever." I'm sure it does: Well-made European lugged frames constructed from Reynolds, Columbus, Excelle, Falk or Durifort tubing tend to ride well forever as long as you don't crash them.
One interesting thing about the Mercx bicycles is that if you removed their decals and paint jobs, they'd be indistinguishable (to most people, anyway) from the classic Italian frames of the day, They even had Italian threads. But they were made in Belgium, the home country of "The Cannibal"--whom I still believe to be the greatest bicycle racer of all time.
Not far from the bike in question was the Statue of Liberty
It's in front of the Loews Building on East 61st Street, just down the block from the Hotel Pierre. This is one of the "drafts," if you will, of the more famous (and much larger) version that looms over the harbor.
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I wonder whether someone has told some tourist that it is indeed that Statue of Liberty, and said tourists went home believing that they indeed saw the "original."
I could barely fit a business card between the brake bridge and tire--which is a 700X25C. Yes, that bike isn't meant to take anything more than 700X23.
The bike is an Eddy Mercx road frame from 1994, built as a single-speed with only a front brake. It owner, who came to unlock it as I was about to snap a picture of the whole bike, says, "It rides as great as ever." I'm sure it does: Well-made European lugged frames constructed from Reynolds, Columbus, Excelle, Falk or Durifort tubing tend to ride well forever as long as you don't crash them.
One interesting thing about the Mercx bicycles is that if you removed their decals and paint jobs, they'd be indistinguishable (to most people, anyway) from the classic Italian frames of the day, They even had Italian threads. But they were made in Belgium, the home country of "The Cannibal"--whom I still believe to be the greatest bicycle racer of all time.
Not far from the bike in question was the Statue of Liberty
It's in front of the Loews Building on East 61st Street, just down the block from the Hotel Pierre. This is one of the "drafts," if you will, of the more famous (and much larger) version that looms over the harbor.
I wonder whether someone has told some tourist that it is indeed that Statue of Liberty, and said tourists went home believing that they indeed saw the "original."
