# Front suspensions on a Merckx?



## kjmunc (Sep 19, 2005)

I know teams experiment with different set-ups during Paris-Roubaix, but I got Graham Watson's "20 Years of Cycling Photography" for Christmas and saw a set-up on a Motorola bike that I hadn't ever seen before. 

The picture is of Sean Yates in the 1994 P-R and he's riding what looks like a Corsa tubed bike (external cable routing, round tubing), with a front suspension MTB fork! Strangely enough, they didn't use the MTB calipers, but have somehow attached regular road calipers to the front brake booster. 

Anyone have any back issues of bike mags that details what they were riding back then? Would be really interesting to see what they rode, as I'd never seen a fork that burly on a Merckx!


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## Kenacycle (May 28, 2006)

I know LeMond in the 1991 Tour De France used the Rock Shox front suspension on his bike. I think that was more of an experimentation of this setup to see how it will work on a road bike. Let me find some pics in my magazines.

The shocks LeMond used was the same RockShox front suspension fork I have on my 14 year old mountain bike.

Here is short article on the shock


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## kjmunc (Sep 19, 2005)

*Yep, great pic*

After a little research I found out that Rock Shox went on to provide the Mag 21 SL and then the Paris-Roubaix front forks to riders in the early 90's. 1994 seemed to be the peak, with Andrei Tchmil winning both P-R and the Ronde on a RS equipped Caloi (Merckx). Yates and Andreu finished in the top 10 of PR on similarly equipped Merckx bikes, and I'm sure many others were riding similar set-ups. 

Interesting stuff......


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