You are reading a single comment by @veloham and its replies.
Click here to read the full conversation.
London Fixed Gear and Single-Speed is a community of predominantly fixed gear and single-speed cyclists in and around London, UK.
This site is supported almost exclusively by donations. Please consider donating a small amount regularly.
veloham
I wanted to make sure the pic would load before I did a lot of typing.
This frame was built for Johnny Pound (JP) who is the seller. Although JP was a leading roadman in the fifties there's surprisingly little about him on the internet. He served an 'apprenticeship' in Belgium in the early fifties, rode the Peace Race in 1955 (British team) and came third in the National Road Championship in 1959, but I know he had a lot of RR victories, probably some on this frame - the net knows nothing of these.
JP is more interesting as a person than his bike frame. You've probably worked out that he's not young - I'm not sure of his exact age, but he can't be far short of ninety, so you're probably assuming that at best he's reduced to an electric bike - not at all! In fact this frame has turned up because he's acquired another Gillot and wanted to use the handlebar stem that was in this one on his next project. Apparently JP did some design work for Gerry Burgess (GB Components) and I believe this stem was a prototype of his design. The stem was jammed and the forks, which were not original and got destroyed in the removal process.
I rode with JP once or twice about six years ago and I can certainly say he was going very well then. On one occasion I felt I was on a good day and tried to ride him off my wheel - when I pulled into the Pub car park confident I was on my own I looked round and there he was, smiling in a way that rather implied he was too polite to outsprint me!
The frame is in Chobham, Surrey and will have to be collected. I think it will have to wait until all the old codgers concerned have had their vaccine booster. I should add this is not really an attempt to make money, more an effort to keep this old frame in use for sentimental reasons.
Before you get too enthusiastic, remember this frame has had a hard life and you will probably need to get new forks made for it.