What differentiates the best bike shops from the rest?
Sometimes it's the simplicity and ease of buying a coffee and a new inner tube before a Sunday spin, or the purchase of winter clothing to get us through the dark days before spring. Whatever it is, the best bikes shops all have something in common; they provide us with pleasure, they remind us of the unadulterated joy we first had for the sport, and for the faintest of moments they have the ability to make time stand still, as if nothing else matters but our wistful gazes upon the immaculate machines and glistening equipment. The best bike shops remind us why we fell in love with cycling.
What first strikes you upon entering the doors at Vecchio's Bicicletteria in downtown Boulder is just how much memorabilia the walls hold. It's simply jaw-dropping. The premises aren't huge; with a delicately small glass counter facing inwards from the front wall, and an open-space floor for the mechanics towards the rear. In between both points are the usual paraphernalia, but it's on the walls where Vecchio's Bicicletteria comes alive. Look upward, and you'll see kits from the last six decades, with a Greg LeMond Worlds jersey sat between strips from 7-Eleven, Molteni and a signed maglia rosa from Andy Hampsten's Giro d'Italia win in 1988. However, there are so many layers to the establishment's nostalgia, and it's the smaller details, the ones you miss when you first walk in, that make the shop stand out.
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Take the front desk, for example. The glass casing immortalizes a pair of vintage Campagnolo Corsa / C-Record SGR-1 pedals, while a Campagnolo shaving kit is propped against them. Just to the right are a set of pin badges from the early 1990s that include Sean Kelly, Laurent Fignon, Marc Madiot, and Gilles Delion. You could spend hours trawling through the collection and still find something new by the end.
The shop was opened back in 1999 when the US cycling scene began its first revival after the LeMond years. Peter Chisholm, a local mechanic and wheel builder at the time had been inspired by an influx of European riders in the mid-90s who had used Colorado as a base for altitude training ahead of one edition of the World Championships. Andy Hampsten had ventured to the state and brought a gaggle of Banesto teammates - including the Indurain's - with him. A star-studded Italian squad followed suit, and for a couple of weeks, the streets were awash with the glitz and glamour of the European peloton.
"There was a big group ride one morning, and the Italians were out, and there were all these intros, and one of the Italians looked over at Peter and said 'ciao Vecchio'," recounts the current owner and the shop's lead mechanic Jim Potter, as he cleans his workstation for this morning's business.
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