The BMX bike all'Italiana

Lo and behold! The Italian take on the budding BMX market of the second half of the 1980s. A wonderful Cinelli frame made of Columbus tubing, gorgeous Campagnolo anodised hubs and crankset, Clement 20" rims, and legendary Regina chains, all the big road Italian manufacturers banding together to create a truly bling-bling "motocross racing" bike, as they liked it to call this Ultima BMX. Click on the image for a larger view.

No wonders then that Cinelli is nowadays taking a similar approach to the fixed gear "hipster" market issuing limited edition frames in collaboration with riders-collective MASH or with artists like Barry McGee. At least, Campagnolo has not considered for the moment a limited edition reissue of its classic vintage track crankset in a whole array of anodised colours... That will be blasphemy, indeed!

A Beauty to Behold!

While looking at eBay for a frame to start my next bike project, I came across this stunning classic Italian road frame made by CIÖCC in Columbus double-butted Reinforced tubing. It was definitely love at first sight! This particular frame appear to be from the early or mid 1980s. It is a fine example of the great Italian frame-building tradition. The classic Italian road bike frames are primarily characterised for their stiffness, responsiveness and great handling which results in very fast, pure-breed, racing machines.

Ciöcc (pronounced “cheeoach”) was founded by builder Giovanni Pelizzoli, a former apprentice of Ugo DeRosa. Ciocc (local Val d’Aosta, Italian dialect for "poker faced" hence the Ciöcc badge of four aces in a cross formation) was his nickname as a pro rider. Although less well known than Cinelli, Colnago, DeRosa or Pinarello, the excellent craftsmanship and attention to detail evidenced in all his frames put him rightly alongside these other renowned Italian frame builders. I particularly love the painting and finishes of the frame: understated and simple yet at the same time elegant.

Check out and enjoy this truly work of art in the pics below:

At the end of the auction, alas, the frame did not sell as the reserve price was not met by any of the bidders, including myself. The other three identical frames (but of different sizes) which were also on auction by the same seller experienced a similar fate. He can definitely take his time to bring them again to the market as these "beauties" in mint condition are not likely to loose any of their value in the foreseeable future. A sound long-term investment indeed!