Many of those who I correspond with privately off the list know of my admiration and respect for American made bicycles and American track stars. I am always expressing my astonishment to them at the lack of information on the list about these two topics. On numerous occasion's have asked these American friends why is this so and why are so many of the list members so lavish in their praise of lets face pretty cheap and nasty Continental made machines. Cinelli for one produced more crap than he did top of the range machines. Although his best efforts are World class. And as for Urago, Peugeot, Bertin, Heylet and Fiorelli forget it, I suppose the one saving grace of all these "Johnny Foreigners" is that their top of the range bikes were built with Reynold's tubing. Please America wake up to your proud heritage of quality bicycle making and equally good riders. But don't knock the UK out of sheer ignorance especially our wonderful racing heritage. Don't forget it was riders like Holland, Robinson, Denson, Simpson who trail blazed the way for English speaking riders in mainland Europe. In the early 60's Europe was a different planet, language barriers, cultural differences etc. France did'nt even know that Presley existed for them Halliday & Hardy were there pop icons. Our riders would have won a lot more races and titles if they had have disobeyed team orders but then they would have been without a contract. The likes of the Brit's I have mentioned were employed because of their talent, no French firm had a snow ball's hell in chance of selling their wares to Britain just because a Brit rode one of their team bikes. They were there because of talent. Just look at Tom's victories Milan-San Remo, Tour of Flanders, Bordeaux-Paris, and Tour of Lombardy.
Best wishes and be lucky. Michael Butler Huntingdon UK.