Icons of cycling: Miguel Indurain's Pinarello Espada

The Italian answer to Chris Boardman’s Lotus superbike was Pinarello’s finest hour

Indurain and the Espada
in full flight on the track. Photo: Graham Watson

The 1990s was the golden era of the aerodynamic carbon monocoque. After the adoption of the material by cycling in the late 1980s, bicycle designers quickly realised they had carte blanche to create whatever shape they found to be most aerodynamic, no matter how outlandish.

At least that was until the Union Cycliste Internationale (UCI) in 2000 enforced its 1996 Lugano Charter, banning any bike without the traditional diamond-shaped frame.

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Simon Smythe