> Note: A few Herse bikes and other high-end makes > hit the east coast. But I was on the east coast > and entering the sport in 1977 I missed out on > knowing about these. > > For most of us, we never knew anything about these > bikes. Campy was the religion and some among us > knew the big picture. But almost all of us had no > clue about french stuff at the time. Mike, It's interesting that you should mention all of that. During the late 1960s I rode a couple of centuries sponsored by the American Youth Hostels and recall seeing some really special French touring bikes. Occasionally, you would see one parked in their offices. Since, as you mention, Campagnolo was the "religion" at the time, I always had ambivalent feelings about these bikes. That is, you could see that they were fabulous machines for cyclo-touring (plus they had Reynolds 531 decals) but you couldn't admit to liking them because they had hardly any - or no - Campagnolo parts. On the other hand, we were always impressed by the cranksets which I now know were from TA and Stronglight. For one thing, many were triples at a time when my friends and I had barely graduated from single chainring bikes. Even the doubles clearly had better ranges for going up hill than the things we were riding. Plus they looked different... A few years later when I moved to D.C. it often seemed to be raining French bicycles (even beyond the ubiquitous Peugeots), many of which were junk but some of which were clearly very nicely prepared for serious touring. Perhaps this was because of the influence of Mel Pinto Imports but, in any event, it was still somewhat difficult for me to get beyond the "lessons" I had learned earlier. C'est la vie, Fred Rednor - Arlington, Virginia
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