1970's Grandis pista (SOLD)

Found another Italian beauty ! A very rare 1970's Grandis pista. . . For over 80 years Grandis has remained devoted to the belief of its founder, Silvino: bicycle-making as a craft, an art rather than a job. In 1930, Silvino Grandis built his first bicycle. Thanks to his youthful enthusiasm, year after year he developed his experience in the field of bicycles. During the difficult period of World War II he carried out extremely varied jobs: a locksmith at the military hospital and an artisan frame-builder for passion. After the war, Silvino decided to continue his work with bicycles, collaborating with both amateur and professional racers as a mechanic on-board the team car during competitions. In 1957, as official mechanic of the “Veneto A” team, he witnessed the triumph of “his” athlete Mino Bariviera at the Amateur Giro d’Italia (ex Milan – San Pellegrino). Silvino’s good reputation soon started to spread and, in 1965, encouraged by his wife Ines, the master frame-builder began to build and sell “Grandis” bicycles. Grandis is a surname that, nowadays, is recognised world-wide as synonym of research, technology and careful craftsmanship. Grandis’s success in the field of competitive racing was immediate: since his very first years of business, several national and international amateur cycling clubs relied on the expert hands of the Veronese bicycle-maker. Teofilo Sanson even convinced Silvino to join the technical staff of his team, with Gianni Motta as its captain. With the company growing and Silvino’s frequent presence at races, it fell to his sons Mario and Ezio to continue their father’s work. In the shop in via Fincato, in Verona, the Grandis brothers experimented with new products and state-of-the-art solutions. Space, however, was becoming an issue as it was no longer enough to welcome their many clients. In 1986 they inaugurated new premises on viale Venezia. This was closely followed by the opening of the factory in Poiano di Valpantena (near Verona), the heart of the Grandis’s manufacturing process. In the inner laboratory, Ezio worked on patents and bicycle frames, including the “Overmax” model (1991), which heralded a new era for the construction of frames. Tungsten inert gas (TIG) welding on special micro-alloyed steels and, later, the arrival of carbon (1998): materials, dedicated technologies, new challenges. Given the huge success of their production activity, the Grandis brothers decided to transfer the whole business to an area of 5,000 m^2 in Poiano di Valpantena: factory, in-house painting unit, warehouse, shop and service centre were now part of one single facility. New technical partnerships were established, including those with Loctite (structural adhesives for carbon), the Italian Institute of Welding (IIS) and the universities of Padua and Parma (carbon frames and correlated lab testing). Today like yesterday, there remains a strong will to succeed. . . 58 center center 60 center top 58 top tube