Steven,
Thank you for the information. Wow, what a tall guy for a 1940s malnourished Italian kid!
If Coppi rode a 59 c-c frame, based on the drawing in Le Cycle (and Le Monde de Daniel Rebour), his seat height was 76 cm. Not very tall for a guy who measures 1.85-1.87 m. Koblet's seat height was 77 cm, based on the same source. So you are right, not a huge difference.
I guess it is just that Koblet put the stem all the way down, Coppi left it a bit higher. Also, assuming these guys were reasonably normal in their proportions (rather than short-legged), it seems that their seats were about 1-2 cm lower than what one would recommend today. I have heard several old riders say that they think today's riders have their seats too high. Any comments?
When did your De Rosa compete in the Tour? I assume not in the 1950s?
Clearly, with a seat height of 76 cm, a modern bike shop would not put Coppi on a 59 cm c-c frame. 55-56 would be more like it. So Italian bike sizes depended very much on the era... (even when discounting "compact" frames that don't belong on the CR list)
I find this info rather fascinating, because it allows us to appreciate the machines in their context, rather than trying to put our modern preconceptions onto them. I am a tad shorter than Coppi, have a slightly shorter seat height, and ride about the same size bike... I just wish I were as fast!
BTW, measuring Rebour drawings isn't perfect, as he drew from photos,
and then we are dealing with xeroxes of the drawings. But checking
the drawings against surviving bikes, I found that they generally are
quite useful - within a cm or so. And that was for bikes where one
had to scale up from wheel diameter... knowing the frame size helps a
lot.
--
Jan Heine, Seattle
Editor/Publisher
Vintage Bicycle Quarterly
http://www.mindspring.com/
>Jan asked:
>
>> How tall was Coppi, anyhow? I know he was tall - Steve Maaslands says
>> Koblet and Coppi were the same height - but was he really THAT tall?
>
>Coppi was variously stated as being 1m85-1m87! He too rode a 59 cm
>c/c frame. I own a De Rosa bike used by Roberto Conti for his 16th
>place finish in the Tour de France, he is 1m88 and it is a 56 cm c/c
>frame. According to Ugo De Rosa, most Americans who get a custom
>made frames end up with frames that are 2-3 cm smaller than what
>they are accustomed to. He says their general reaction is of
>disbelief until they take the bike out for a ride. They then never
>want to return to the larger frame size.
>
>--
>Steven Maasland
>Moorestown, NJ
>> According to Le Cycle (Aug. 4, 1951, quoted from VBQ vol. 2, No. 2),
>> Koblet measured 186 cm. They don't say whether this is with socks or
>> barefoot.
>>
>> His frame was a 59, assuming c-c. That is small! Maybe the largest
>> stock frame La Perle made?
>>
>> (Toni Theilmeier reported that Koblet used a stock frame to win the
>> Giro. That must have been the 1950 Giro, according to J-P Ollivier's
>> book the only one he won, unless I overlooked something. So maybe he
>> liked the stock bike, because one would assume that after a Giro win,
>> he'd get a custom bike. Or maybe not. He was not the favorite for
>> that Tour in 1951. Did racers have to buy their own frames back then,
>> which they had relabeled as whatever they were supposed to ride, or
>> did their sponsors pick up the tab? I suspect they had to pay
>> themselves. Maybe some preferred to save their money and ride what
>> they were given?)
>>
>> --
>> Jan Heine, Seattle
>> Editor/Publisher
>> Vintage Bicycle Quarterly
>> http://www.mindspring.com/
>>
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