Having just watched the end of today's T de F stage, I was particularly struck by the seeming fragility of CF frames after the spectacular crash of the Gerolsteiner(?) rider and the pictures of his bike flying through the air and breaking into two halves upon landing. It got me thinking about past Tours (within the CR time frame) and whether any steel frames reacted the same way when crashed? I know forks broke, but did lugged steel framesets break in half or fly apart at the seams like this? Was it more a question of bent but not broken? I don't remember such things over the past 30 years of watching!
Paul B. Williams, BAH, MPhil, PhD
Ottawa, Ontario, Canada
castell5@sympatico.ca