<classicrendezvous@bikelist.org> Sent: Friday, May 06, 2005 6:50 PM Subject: Re: [CR]ultimate French bike?
> I suspect it was the same as with the Peugeots - the racers didn't
> ride what was written on their bikes. They went to the custom
> builders.
How do we know this? It's oft-mentioned here that Merckx's "PX-10" was a Masi or something painted in Peugeot livery. Convince me.
Let me get this straight: Eddy Merckx is a 21 year-old newcomer to the BP-Peugeot Team in 1966 after just two years as a professional and four pro victories. Not exactly a "top rider". In the recent "Cycle Sport" issue devoted to him, he says how green he was when he joined Peugeot and how he found the first nurturing environment there and learned a lot from Tom Simpson. And he supposedly tells the team manager and owners: "PX-10s suck and I'm not riding one!" Somehow that doesn't ring quite true to me. Did Tom ride a PX-10? Sure looks like he did to me. Unless they took some chi-chi Italian frame, stuck Nervex lugs on it, an AVA "death stem", Simplex derailleurs and even Mafac brakes! And gave it a sloppy Peugeot paint job to fool everyone. One web site mentions how Eddy said his Peugeot "handled and rode like a dog". So if he was riding a Masi, how did he know this? He left the BP Peugeot squad at the end of the 1967 season. I count 16 race and stage victories for him wearing the white and black chequerboard (assuming he deigned to wear the team livery!)
The PX-10 that Tom Simpson won the Paris-Nice in '65 is at the little museum to him in Nottinghamshire along with another of his Peugeots. It would be interesting to see these and indeed any belong to Merckx if they have the lazy lugwork, cheap paint and sundry other horrors that were the hallmark of one of the best racing bikes of the era. All really built, I suspect, by indifferent, clock-watching and anonymous French factory workers.
Peter Kohler
Washington DC USA