We've got 100 Colnagos

and 100 pinarellos - that gentle sobbing noise is roberto 'bling bling' crying

velodrome in Forli where pantani used to train, just rocked up and got shown around by a great old giffer who told me i was 3 times the man pantani was, cheeky bastard! They were absolutely mad about their track racing - couple of pics here, more on me flickr

Did you get to ride round the track? The banking at the far end looks STEEP.

the italian under 23's were riding at the time and i didn't want to show them up :^]

banking is way steeper than herne hill!

The photo makes it look pretty damn near vertical behind the goals. Probably designed that way to stop footballs bouncing out of the ground. :-)

did you ask to buy one?

Puts the facilities at Herne Hill to shame doesn't it? :(

the old geezer couldn't believe that people rode track bikes on the street in London -

He was much more interested in showing me the carbon Pinarellos, couldn't quite get why I was drooling over the 'workhorse' colnagos

think it helps that the sunshine means they can have a mad steep banking Joe

lovely old geared bike they had in the trophy room

amazing.

the track, the bikes..

mad.

I'm speechless.

phenomenal

I love italy,

Ive only ever been there a week and a half.

But what a great place,

A place still full of old school "steel is real" quality, in every aspect.

think I might go for a longer explore there, ride the 'dromes, ride the mountains, ride the slopes, ride the vespas, get frowned on by the ladies and come back with a a sackful of track bike loot. And a vintage ducati

We should start a campaign to get Herne Hill up to those kinda standards... How many world champions have we got? And Herne Hill is still the capital's only velodrome ('til the Olympics o' course)! I'd love to see the old lady restored to her former glory, such a magical place...

Show me de Pinars, Please Daddy . . . (wee-wee)!

Nice Wayno, you still in Italy. I've been in Rome for 3 months and just to put things into perspective for you lot here's a photo of the velodrome in Rome!

^nooooo. it's like something out of LOST.

Meh... Still doable. HTFU!

Yup. I was hoping to get here and be in pista heaven but they're obviously not so keen round these parts! Seen some nice road bikes obviously but nothing in the way of track stuff.

^gears lol

Show me de Pinars, Please Daddy . . . (wee-wee)!

you would have had to have a sit down if you saw the carbon pinnar track bike the U23 champ was riding Paul!

in hong kong

shimano wheels shouldn't be on colnago

those crazy dutch bastards…

they will be murdered in Italy

they will be murdered in Italy

taken at the giro 4 days ago, saw plenty of italian race bikes with 'yankee' bits on them

favourite spot was a blue race bike with blue arrospok front and back, too fleeting a glimpse to get a photo…