Famous French marque and colour as depicted by this picture of the Mercier bike.

Following the book on Luis Ocana ( see that particular web page) I have presented once more another book cover from my French days , this time on Raymond Poulidor who I had the pleasure of racing against during his retirement year in the Winter of 1977 when one such as he normally did the rounds of the cyclo cross season that had tagged on from the previous road racing season. However my next piece of writing will include the Frenchman but only as a main chapter within a book that will be based upon his long term bike sponsor - Cycles Mercier, hence the rest of the title - Tickled Pink.

Hopefully. by the time the book on Luis Ocana has been published by me in a few months time I once again will have gathered a substanital amount of material to give justice to a long term bike manufacturer.

Late 1970`s Serge Perin pictured here in the Miko Mercier kit,one of the cycling jerseys I bought whilst in France - made of acrilic material which was a popular at the time and used substantially by the clothing manufacturers. Somewhat ironic that even then lots of bike riders bought their favourite team jerseys-as usual ten years ahead of football supporters?

One of many cycle/bike posters available from All Posters - ironically Cycles Mercier!

2010 My pink frame - originally red white and blue colours this special edition Brevet frameset having been built into a bike for me by Thorns back in 2001 and although this is steel tubing it is very light.I thought it was abouit time for a bit of retro hence the SIS down tube levers courtsey of Shimano, but this has been married up with an upto date Shimano double ring C/Set 48/34 (with the axle now being attached to the right hand crank)which the original being a treble but the granny ring was rarely used.Most of the other equipment will be put back on the frame although the saddle was well passed its sell by date so that will be a new one. The frame sprayer also made new decals for the frame on the style as before with the addition of my website address on the top tube.

The finished article! Maybe the handlebar tape could have been white instead of the fact nowadays there is a wider availability pink being one of them!! So there must a large call for it? The A Head style handlebar stem is there simply bcause at the time I couldn`t source an old style longer alloy stem than had been in the frame so in the end compromised with creating the above.