Riding with Greg...in mind.

For as long as I can recall, I've always been riding with Greg LeMondin mind. He's been my inspiration every time I'm having a hard time on a saddle. When I was a kid I used to pretend I was him. Nowadays it's become more of a...style. Geeky, of course, but I don't care, cycling to me has always been linked to many, many happy childhood memories. Check it out.

Drawing circa 1985 :

Me in 1985 : the bike is not a Gitane, I added Gitane stickers...

Me, in 1986 : my fake Gitane is now a fake Look

My ride :

This is my "new" bike. In fact it is a Trek-US Postal 2003 bike that was given to me by my big brother (many thanks to him). I've never been an Armstrong fan so I wasn't too excited about the painting & stickers so...

I tried to make this bike as close to Greg's 1983 Gitane bike, the one he had when he won his first rainbow jersey. I was 9 at the time and this is when it all started for me as a Greg LeMond fan. You see, we had this habit with my father & older brother to race on our bikes, pretending we were champions. One week before the actual race in Switzerland, we made our own world championship. My father was Fignon, my brother was Hinault and I was Greg. Needless to say...I won. Then the real Greg won too ! That was a sign.

This is my tribute to Greg and the great many years I spent since then enjoying his victories and inspiration over & over again.

This bike has been painted in the same electric blue, I added yellow tape on the handlebars and switched from shimano to campagnolo group to get as close as the 1983 modolo brakes as possible. I finally found good reproductions of Gitane decals on e-bay Australia.

What's really funny is that I took the bike to get this done only 2 weeks prior to Trek dropping LeMond bikes.

I appreciate the kind of irony this bike gives to that story.

First pics : spring 2008

Summer 2008 : Benotto tape

Spring 2009 : yellow saddle & bottle cages