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History: I bought this bike as a frameset in June 1997; in those days, prior to Lance riding one, there were very few around, and it was nice and exclusive. Since Lance has been doing his Tour winning thing on the same frame though, every Tom, Dick and Fred has one... but at least mine doesn't have USPS stickers all over it! The new frames haven't changed too much, only dropping 160g and changing the brake cable routing. I first built it up on a tight budget, so it had a Veloche groupset and nothing very special in the way of other kit. But it has gradually had more expensive bits bolted on - helped by my working in the bike industry for a while - turning into a bit of a lightweight project. I recently worked out its retail cost as the same as Trek's top of the range machine - but my bike comes in at three pounds lighter, go figure. Purpose: This bike is only used for racing. It is such a phsycological edge to pull out something special when you have been training on a bike twice the weight! Plus I wouldn't want to wear the expensive kit out by using it all the time. Mostly used for road racing, but also hillclimbs and the occasional time trial. A fantastic bike, it goes up hills like nothing else, and (theorectically at least) won't fatigue like an aluminium frame of similar weight - five full racing seasons so far. 
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