I remember he won the 1932 Los Angeles Olympic road race and held the hour record... pretty impressive!
- Olympic Champion by teams in 1932. - 2 times Champion of Italy on road: 1931 (amateur) - 1936. - Champion of Italy of medium-distance race in 1940. - 2 times winner of Milan-San-Remo: 1935 - 1938. - Winner of 19 stages of the Turn of Italy. - Recordman of the World of the Hour in 1935: 45,090 km. - Recordman of Italy of the hour in 1937: 45,363 km.
Chuck Schmidt South Pasadena, Southern California
On Aug 15, 2006, at 3:47 PM, ternst wrote:
> Olmo has always been one of the upper quality lower profile companies.
> I think there were 5 brothers in the original company.
> and one of the bros. was a champion Italian racer, don't remember
> his palmares, but was very well known throughout Europe.
> The racing brother was in the '20's / '30's era.
> Each of the brothers ran a different division of the factory
> complex, bikes, sewing machines, motorcycles, production, sales.
> You get the idea.
> As the family aged and the various areas of production changed with
> death in family some of the divisions changed or were merged.
> I think the reason that Olmo was not in the "big time" is that they
> didn't sponsor big teams or had a big time racer on payroll.
> Bianchi had Coppi, Legnano had Bartali, etc., during the halcyon
> years.
> Olmo probably sponsored some minor and/or amateur teams but it was
> more conservative and low key.
> Back in 1960 I started selling Olmo as well as Bianchi and Legnano
> out here in California and these machines were all considered to be
> of equal quality, and sold fairly evenly.
> As far as I know, someone in the Midwest is bringing them in and
> the company is still going,
> There are too many brands on the market now, and with this glut of
> bikes only the more aggressive and trendy or catchy names make it
> in our fickle market.
> There are a few biggies with US companies going well too, but for
> many the slice of the pie is pretty small, regardless how pretty
> the poseur jerseys and paint jobs look.
> These guys look great at the bike shows, but the glitz is far
> greater than the economic strength.
> However, the bikes are nice.
> Ted Ernst
> Palos Verdes Estates
> Ca, USA
> ----- Original Message ----- From: "Feeken, Dirk"
> <dirk.feeken@sap.com>
> To: <Classicrendezvous@bikelist.org>
> Sent: Tuesday, August 15, 2006 8:40 AM
> Subject: [CR]Olmo reputation
>
>
>> I've never placed Olmo bicycles into the top category of collectables
>> like early Masi, Cinelli or Pogliaghis but have seen them like most
>> other italian brands ( Basso, Rossin, Pinarello, Chesini,
>> Somec...) as
>> typical nice italian steel but nothing very special.
>> But now I have here a japanese bicycle collectors magazin from 2003,
>> it's a special edition "Vintage Road Bikes" of a publisher named "For
>> Tasty Life". (they got it!)
>> Next to long japanese illustrated articles ("The road to 700C") and
>> japanese builders it features only a small handfull of collectible
>> bicycles each on several pages with beautiful large pictures: a 1950s
>> Bianchi, 1949 Legnano, 1960s Cinelli, 1970 Masi, 1973 Colnago, two
>> Rene
>> Herse, a Hetchins and a 1979 Olmo with nicely panthographed Super
>> Record
>> parts.
>> Each bike has a small english description. Especially the Olmo is
>> described as:
>> "This beautiful machine was manufactured in 1979. It shows a strong
>> flavour of the drilled hole period of Eddy Merckx, although it was
>> made
>> slightly later. The finish is actually much finer and more elaborate
>> than his bike. Olmo has been known as an atelier which creates
>> quality
>> racing bikes with love to the bicycle"
>> Does anybody else also see Olmos as on par with Masi, Cinelli, and
>> the
>> early Colnagos and even more remarkable as "much finer and more
>> elaborate" than Eddies Masis, Colnagos and de Rosas?
>>
>> BTW: the ISBN of this (for me unreadable but) beautiful
>> publication is
>> ISBN4-87099-892-0
>>
>> Just wondering,
>> Dirk
>>
>> --
>> Dirk Feeken
>> Heidelberg
>> Germany