At 11:34 PM -0500 10/26/09, Calvert Guthrie wrote:
>Thanks, Jan...
>
>So those Guidonnet levers that fit the Randonneur bars so well
>were designed to fit these bars rather than the other way around?
Perhaps - I really don't know. The Guidonnet levers, for those who have no mental image, are like mountain bike levers that clamp near the stem, but go under the bars and sweep forward, so you can brake from the tops and from that "Randonneur" position, but not from the drops.
A nice example is here:
http://www.flickr.com/
Those levers never were very common... Nicolas Frantz used standard brake levers in the 1928 Tour de France, and I don't think the Guidonnet levers are that old.
Jan Heine
Editor
Bicycle Quarterly
2116 Western Ave.
Seattle WA 98121
http://www.vintagebicyclepress.com