Believe me, I know what you're thinking and no, it's not Photoshop, just a wacky Merckx Mondays brought to you by those little nuanced moments in cycling and Tears for Gears. If you're as confused as I was when I first saw this photo, you've gotta check out the rest of the post!
Edi Merukusu Mondays!
Just like the US and UK Falcon, Eddy Merckx also licensed bicycles to Miyata in Japan during the early 70's. These bikes were fabricated in Japan and marketed to the Japanese cyclists in every way imaginable.
Images courtesty of Cyclo Tourist
With touring, camping, city, track and yes, even radball options, the Miyata-built Merckx bikes hit the target market on the head. I'd love to have a Miyata-built Merckx tourer.
How about a mixte?
Or a touring bike with Merckx-branded panniers! We saw the radball bike above, which is by far the nuttiest thing I think I've ever posted on this blog. I wish I could find higher-resolution images of the track bike too. It's clearly a Keirin-inspired geometry with the track stem and tight angles. Simply awesome.
Here I was, worried about making a post for today, freaking out about my computer crashing and all along, Jeremy from Tears for Gears was there to offer a hand with today's content. Seriously man, I can't thank you enough!
Comments
That first bike is made to play RadBall,
aka bike soccer.
Posted by: Dan | August 9, 2010 5:24 PM
completely missed where you wrote radball in the post, my bad
Posted by: Dan | August 9, 2010 5:25 PM
all good!
Posted by: prolly | August 9, 2010 5:33 PM
That touring Merckx(triple triangle!?) is amazing I'd love to have one of those set up like that in a 60-62cm. If that's the way it came stock, that's the best out of the box tourer I've seen; esp from that era! Great post! I wonder how hard it would be to track one of these down?
Thanks man now I have a grail touring bike to look for! Haha!
Posted by: Jangles | August 9, 2010 10:26 PM
that first cycle is super rad, but it remindes me of CycleBall,
Posted by: caesar | August 9, 2010 11:23 PM
rad ball = cycle ball
does no one read? haha
Posted by: prolly | August 9, 2010 11:33 PM
don't you know that by now john? the internet is only for showing people how much smarter you are than they by snide comments, only to get thwarted by your own ego and short attention span..
Posted by: ben | August 10, 2010 8:19 AM
Merckx was not fooling around even when he licensed his name in Japan. Miyata was probably the best choice to do the job.
Posted by: Chris Protopapas | August 12, 2010 4:32 PM