dirty sundays

MTB Racing History collection.

 

My main goal is to preserve the racing history of mountain biking.

Therefore I search race bikes which mainly have played an important role at the highest level events, the UCI Mountain Bike World Championships (since 1990), the UCI Mountain Bike World Cup (since 1991), or at the Olympic Games (since 1996).

 

Most bikes come in a poor, incomplete or not original condition, I especially love this challenge to figure out at what event(s) the bike was used and with what parts it was build. This takes hours, days, months - searching and comparing blurry photos and playing low resolution videos forth and back, over and over again to maybe get a glimpse of the detail that I'm looking for.

It also means contacting riders, mechanics, photographers etc from back then and keep annoying them, trying to get informations, photos or even parts.

 

Talking about race bikes and their parts, they often were prototypes and were taken off after the race to analyze in the company lab. Parts were changed regularly, even during events in between practice and the race. Some parts were labeled with false stickers, to acquire the sponsorship deals. It's for sure a detective work. A race bike will most likely never be 100% done, there're always questionable details and that's why I can keep looking at them over and over again, while I'm getting bored with any standard bike build after it's completed and there's no more purpose to me to keep those bikes.

 

I'd also like to thank everyone who's helping and supporting me with finding or giving me informations, parts, bikes, jerseys, race numbers etc. as well as everyone who's stoked and interested about the history and the bikes I restore.

 

I'm excited to share the news that 3 bikes of my collection will be on permanent display at the MTB Hall of Fame in Fairfax, CA.

 

With help from some partners, I also started organizing events like Velo Cosmos, where we want to go out to the public, showcase the bikes and share their history.

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Cheers,

Laurent