Painted on downtube logo and "falck" tubing decal.
Legnano seatstay lug and original cable and pump clips.
FB hubs with Simplex skewers.
Chromed steel Cinelli stem and bars with Brass badge.The rough condition of this Legnano differs from the barely used Legnano in the previous post but it is far more interesting to me. I have always been drawn to old things that have lived the life they were made to live. When I see a classic bicycle or car that has been restored to the condition it was in when it left the showroom floor I find that most of the history that usually makes them so interesting has been essentially erased. This Roma Olimpiade has escaped that fate and is everything I look for in a vintage bike. It has lived a hard life in the past 50 years yet it has somehow retained nearly all of it's components. Other then the front brake cable, handlebar tape and incredible 1950's swiss cheese FB hubs the bike is virtually original. In a bunch of places the green clear-coat has been rubbed and chipped away to reveal the silver undercoat and the chrome is hazy in places yet all the pinstripes, decals and badges are intact. It still has red tape under all the clamped on components, which was probably done by the first owner to protect the paint, and red rubber covers over the shift levers to soften the many thousands of shifts they have made.
The Roma Olimpiade was the top of the line racing model for Legnano and this first Campagnolo Record parts group was to become the standard for all serious racing cyclists, remaining almost unchanged for the next 20 years. In this way I see this bike as an example of a machine that was made at the height of technological achievement and consensus, perhaps one of the first to closely resemble the next generation of modern racing bicycles. Luckily, it is a bike that exists almost exactly as it did in the sixties and it is therefore far more informative and precious then a restored bike that lives exactly as its present owner thinks it should.
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