The Competition Bicycle

Explore the development of the modern performance bicycle through the actual bicycles ridden by champions and amateurs! The bikes in this gorgeous large-format book are the actual machines that went to battle on the mountain passes of the great tours. Others whirled around the banked oval of a track. There is a René Herse tandem came first in Paris-Brest-Paris and in the Poly de Chanteloup hillclimb race. Join the newspaper carriers as they raced over the cobblestones of Paris with 15 kg of newspapers on the front rack. Witness how mountain bikers did away with roads altogether and raced on mountain trails.

All these bikes tell the stories of their riders and events, but they also take you on a journey through bicycle technology. See how pneumatic tires revolutionized cycling, how derailleurs made their tentative forays into the professional peloton, how racers tried to gain an advantage with aluminum frames, how indexed shifting and clipless pedals came to define the modern performance bike. See highlights like Campagnolo’s immortal Super Record groupset, but also dead-ends like the aero components of the 1980s.

The Competition Bicycle is a celebration of beautiful bicycles lovingly crafted for one purpose only: to go as fast as possible. If you enjoy bicycles, you’ll find this book hard to put down.